The industry association representing more than 90 percent of New Zealand’s crop protection and animal health industries has a new name. Animal and Plant Health New Zealand was previously called Agcarm and recently joined forces with the Animal Remedy and Plant Protectant Association. The association represents a one-billion-dollar industry with a value of $20 billion […]
Arable, Grains & Seeds
Honouring the arable sector’s tall poppies
New Zealand’s arable industry is on the hunt for its ‘tall poppies’ – not to chop them down but to celebrate their achievements and to inspire others. “We’re a sector that generates $800 million of sales a year, $260m of that in exports, and we’re determined to better highlight to fellow New Zealanders the role […]
Squeezed global supply opens up milling wheat opportunities for NZ growers
‘Give us our daily bread’, the prayer goes. Trouble is, says Federated Farmers Arable Chairperson Colin Hurst, significant price rises for flour-based products may be on the horizon for local consumers. Prices for milling wheat delivered to Christchurch in mid-May were $600-$630 per tonne, which is around $200 more than last year. “So that’s a […]
Feds calling out shoddy behaviour
By Karen Williams, Vice-President, Federated Farmers of NZ While an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in Indonesia has Australasian biosecurity authorities on high alert, on a more local and human scale it’s a deplorable case of ‘foot in mouth’ that grabbed headlines in New Zealand last week. DLG chief executive Simon Henry’s offensive, misogynist […]
FALL ARMYWORM UPDATE AND DETECTION
As many of you would’ve heard or read by now, Biosecurity New Zealand and primary sector partners are continuing to respond to the discovery of fall armyworm in New Zealand. It is important that you have the below information no matter what sector you’re in because, despite the fact that fall armyworm larvae favours sweetcorn […]
Andrew wraps the week…
Andrew Hoggard with an update on He Waka Eke Noa. “We’ve been pushing for changes that we want to see, that we think make the farm level a better option than what it currently is. But it’s still too early to tell whether we’re going to get this thing in a good enough place that […]
Co-ops work hard to blunt fertilizer price roller-coaster
War in Ukraine, disruption to global supply chains, galloping shipping prices, food security concerns…it’s hardly surprising that when Ravensdown’s Mike Whitty is asked for a fertilizer situation outlook he says “extreme volatility, and that’s not going to change for the foreseeable future”. Mike, Ravensdown’s General Manager Supply Chain, was the expert speaker in a Federated […]
Unseasonable rain behind arable ‘harvest from hell’
Three weeks of on and off rain, with the weekend’s storm a sting in the tail, have caused widespread damage to arable crops up and down the country. “Talking to farmers who have been around for a while, some of them are calling it the worst harvest season in living memory,” Federated Farmers Arable Chairperson […]
Stretched rural contractors taken past breaking point
Stressed rural contractors, told in mid-December they could bring in 200 more skilled machinery operators, have not yet seen a single arrival given any MIQ space. Rural Contractors NZ CEO Andrew Olsen says despite the best efforts of MPI staff to help find MIQ beds for the approved operators, the indications now are that few, […]
Feds survey shows slight uptick in farmer-bank relationship
Farmers are feeling slightly more satisfied with the relationships with their banks but interest rates are starting to rise and some are reporting a tougher attitude from lenders. Results from the November Federated Farmers Banking Survey show 67 percent of the more than 900 respondents are satisfied with their bank relationship, up 5.5 points on […]