When I ask him to sum up his four years as president, he shakes his head and says (in his distinctive Scottish accent): “Four years eh, it certainly doesn’t seem like four years at all.”
Without further hesitation, he adds: “It’s been fantastic – a marvellous experience. I’ve said many times I wish that everybody would have the opportunity to be the IDF president. It gives you an enormous insight into how other people do things, and that’s tremendously advantageous when you translate that back into your own situation. And it gives you fantastic access to people in the world who are influencing the dairy industry at a global level.”
A really interesting journey and an eye opener at times. Begg recalls going to a dairy processor in India run entirely by students. “Seeing that process was really quite remarkable. As was getting to understand the Chinese dairy situation and getting to really understand how important China is to the future of the world’s dairy industry.”
His role had also given him an understanding of how political change affects the dairy industry. “I really mean that. I’ve been to countries where they’ve experienced significant political change, or where the government has taken a real interest in the development of the dairy industry. Those that spring to mind are Ukraine and Kenya.”
“Governments have a tremendous impact on the future prosperity of agricultural industries like dairy – an enormous impact,” he says. And he wasn’t necessarily talking about price regulation. “The interest in and the support for the dairy industry from governments is absolutely crucial. It’s always a good thing for the industry to be on good terms with its governments, and being able to see that process working in so many countries has been a major thing.”
Roles such as IDF president can often appear one thing, when the reality is rather different. Did Begg find the job what he expected it to be? Rather boringly, he did … in the main.
“Life is full of surprises, so there were aspects of it that were rather different, but all in all I don’t think there was anything I came across that I didn’t anticipate. It was what I expected.”
The important thing with trade associations, though, is to keep them ahead of the game, anticipating change. And that was one of his big challenges: persuading the organisation to encompass change. “Implementing change isn’t always easy, and is often beset with complications,” he says. “But the crucial thing is to stay relevant to your members so that your members continue to support you because of your relevance. Their businesses are changing all the time, you have to change as well. That’s what I’ve tried to do in the IDF.”
And Begg believes he has been successful. One major focus of his four years was getting the IDF to understand the importance of communication. He believes that there has been a sea of change in the IDF.
When he started as president, the strategy was to communicate its output purely through its membership. “But there are issues where a global voice is necessary, and I think now the IDF is much more prepared to speak globally on important issues that come along,” he says.
Begg could also see the importance of nutrition climbing up the agenda, “so I really pushed hard to focus more on this and allocate resources on that. That took some time but the IDF took it on board and we increased our nutritional expertise.”
Part of that strategy was the employment of nutritionist Sandra Tuijtelaars. “She’s doing a great job and bringing tremendous benefit to the membership.” says Begg.
Environment was another area that the dairy industry worldwide had to get to grips with. “Especially with a very unhelpful report from the FAO – Livestock’s Long Shadow. Based on very little information, it was written in a way that was very extreme and severe. It was very damaging.”
Begg said the industry has had to live with that and it’s been a priority of his to try to develop an ability to get better information about the true picture of dairy out there. “We’ve now got our act together, got resource behind that and have a very active organisation pushing forward and getting information out into the open. Information that’s very different from that in the FAO report.”
Another focus has been membership. “If the IDF is going to influence global bodies, it has to be representative of all the global dairy industry. So it has to have members from poor countries, members from rich countries, it has to have members from all the great trading areas of the world.”
Under Begg’s presidency, membership has risen from 42 countries to 56 countries and it has established much greater penetration in areas of the world where it was previously underrepresented. “So now when you look at the map of IDF membership, it’s very impressive,” says Begg. “Our coverage is probably something around 80% of global milk production. That gives us enormous potential to take on big issues.”
And there’s no shortage of these. “As trade globalises, as companies globalise, more and more decisions are taken by bodies that operate globally – and that is the IDF market.”
When I ask him if there have been any frustrations; things he hadn’t been able to achieve, he sidesteps neatly like a world-class striker. “You talk about frustrations. I’m a Glasgow Rangers supporter, so I’m totally practiced in the business of managing frustrations.”
What shape is the IDF in, I wonder? “Good shape,” he says immediately. “Membership is rising, it has great coverage around the world, there’s a strategic plan that will focus the work programme for the future, and we’ve developed an ability to work with other organisations.”
And it will need to be in good shape, with lots of issues coming down the line – things like food safety, disease control, setting of standards, nutrition, the environment, etc. “All global issues that are being increasingly addressed by global bodies,” he adds, “and the IDF is perfectly positioned to take on that role.”
Among the challenges is one that’s ever present: red tape. Begg said it was a bit like a family where one of the kids doesn’t want to do this or do that and nothing moves. “Think of that on a global basis and you can start to appreciate the difficulties. We must constantly strive to minimise the red tape and the bureaucracy.”
While waiting for Begg to finish a phone conversation, I chat to Fiona, his PA at Dairy UK. Perhaps mischievously, I wonder if the staff are looking forward to his IDF retirement. Perhaps they’re looking for ways to make sure he’s out of the office more, now that he’d have extra time on his hands.
The Dairy UK director general returns before I’m able to hear her response, but he’s fulsome in his praise of the support he’s received from the staff at both the IDF and at Dairy UK. “Without any question, there’s no doubt that I’ve been able to do this job because of the high quality of the staff. Absolutely no question about that.”
There’s been a global economic downturn and China has been dealing with a major dairy problem recently. Is all of this good for global dairy? “There’s solid demand driven by population trends and driven by income trends,” says Begg. “Yes, I know that things are a little unsure at the moment, but in the long-term, there’s positive demand coming through from that.
“There’s positive demand coming from the fact that consumers worldwide like dairy products. There’s an extremely impressive record of innovation by dairy companies in terms of its products. And all of that sets out a very positive future.”
The removal of price regulation had made the markets much more volatile, and that could lead to negative messages. He sounds a warning: “If you allow the doom and gloom merchants to prevail, it shatters confidence and you enter a vicious circle. You must keep your eye on the medium- to long-term future of the industry.”
One of Begg’s concerns is on the need to get the health messages across: “We must be aiming for a situation where governments never have an opportunity to advise consumers not to consume dairy products for either nutritional or environmental reasons.
“The dairy industry around the world has been working closely with governments to achieve that situation. In some cases, that requires product formulation, and we’re doing that. But we mustn’t forget that we’re selling healthy and nutritious products and we cannot stint on our global efforts to constantly remind people of that fact.
“It would be a bad situation and unacceptable if at the same time as we were working with governments to change things, they were advising consumers not to consume dairy.”
So, the end of a four-year journey. No doubt the IDF’s immediate past president can now concentrate on Dairy UK’s battles with the Food Standards Agency and the National Farmers Union, but that’s another story.
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