Growing up on a 2000 hectare mixed farming enterprise at Benalla, Mr Long always intended on becoming a farmer and worked as a jackaroo in the Riverina after high school, alongside shearing and wool classing, but pulled out after the price of wool crashed in the late 1980s.

“It was something I had always wanted to do, but I think it’s becoming increasingly hard with costs and overheads and weather and climate change,” Mr Long explained.

Now, he juggles acting commitments with running his Strathbogie Ranges property and will soon be seen on Win television narrating A Step Ahead – The Future in Farming.

The film follows several Victorian farming families and documents the daily challenges they face and how they are being overcome.

Common problems for the families interviewed were lower rainfall and rising costs, according to Mr Long.

“I think it is becoming harder and harder to be a farmer; you have to be far more efficient and innovative than ever before.”

The families documented in the film had mostly spoken with consultants or gotten the perspective of an outsider, to tackle their changing farming environment, Mr Long said.

These discussions had helped the families improve efficiency, free up labour through investment and also assisted emotionally by getting farmers together to talk about their issues.

*Extract. Full report Stock & Land, July 2.