by Bonnie Collings
Despite cost-of-living and economic pressures, Farm World saw an increase in patrons across the three day event at Lardner Park.

Lardner Park chief executive officer Craig Debnam said Farm World 2025 was a "great success."
A total of 42,093 people attended the three-day event, with Saturday being the most attended day "by a country mile" according to Mr Debnam.
While maintaining the three-day timeline from previous years, this year's event kicked off on Thursday and concluded on Saturday, shifting away from the Friday to Sunday timeline.
Mr Debnam said strong attendance numbers on Saturday indicated the new timeline was successful.
"We had 16,200 (attendees) on Saturday," he said.
"Those numbers are significantly up on last year's Saturday. I would suggest, people that genuinely want to come to Farm World as an agricultural field day came Thursday and Friday, and we had a fantastic day for urbanites and people in this growing region on Saturday."
Mr Debnam said Farm World would stick to the Thursday to Saturday format for next year's event.
"We're really pleased and think the three-day format of Thursday through Saturday worked extremely well," he said.
"We promised that we would trial it for two years and certainly the first part of that trial has been a success. Hopefully as people get more accustomed to Thursday through Saturday, it'll only grow from there."
A total of 708 brands were represented across exhibitors at the event and all exhibitor sites were full.
"To have a full site and then those sorts of patron numbers coming through to enjoy what the event offers from all of those exhibitors was very heartening, given that there's a cost-of-living crisis," Mr Debnam said.
The Village Green hospitality zone returned this year with much success.
"It created a fantastic vibe," Mr Debnam said. "It was really well received. Patrons embraced the opportunity to have a seat, have something to eat and try local producers' distilled products and brews."
The Village Green also hosted an exhibitor networking event on Thursday night.
New to Farm World this year was "AgTech Alley", an area dedicated to technology business that supports the agri-business sector.
"I believe it was really well received on primary producers' inquiry," Mr Debnam said. "We're pleased and it's something we can build on for next year."
The ever-popular Farm World Rodeo saw a crowd of 6575 flock to Lardner Park on Saturday night to witness the intensity of the top bull riders and bulls from across Australia.
Also on Saturday, about 300 people helped Farm World familiar face Happy the steer celebrate his second birthday by cutting a cake and singing happy birthday.
Looking ahead to Farm World 2026, Mr Debnam said the team was "reasonably optimistic".
"There's a cost-of-living crisis at the moment and the patrons of Gippsland and the greater region really came out and supported the event, which we're thrilled with," Mr Debnam said. We just hope to continue to tweak and improve the event for 2026."
Farm World Demo Day
Tomorrow (Wednesday), a Farm World Demo Day will be held at Lardner Park.
A free event for local farmers and primary producers, the demo day will feature a variety of hay and silage equipment demonstrations from dealers including Claas, Gendore, Kubota and TTMI.
"We're hoping we'll get a good crowd of local farmers into the paddock on Wednesday," Mr Debnam said.
The event will run from 9am to 2pm. Entry is via Lardner Park Gate 5 on Currie Rd in Lardner.