Four in the running for prestigious title

 PGG Wrightson animal nutritionist, Andrea Murphy of Alexandra; dairy director, Wilma van Leeuwen of Waimate; Southland demonstration farm director, Elaine Cook of Waikato; and

Federated Farmers board member and provincial president Katie Milne of Kumara, West Coast, will all be in the running for the prestigious title. 

Organised by the
Dairy Women’s Network and sponsored by Fonterra, the award includes a 12-month scholarship to the Breakthrough Leaders Programme run by Global Women New Zealand, valued at $25,000.

Dairy Women’s Network chief executive Zelda de Villiers says it will be tough choosing the overall winner because they all four depict the Dairy Woman of the Year very well. “They are strong performing, passionate, influential and intelligent women who are dedicated to seeing the dairy industry thrive for future generations and the whole of New Zealand,” she says.

The finalists were individually interviewed by a panel of five judges including Mark Heer from DWN’s gold partner ASB Bank, Sandy Burghan, Global Women representative, DWN trustee Alison Gibb, DWN chair and 2014 Dairy Woman of the Year winner Justine Kidd, and Fonterra representative Janet Rosanowski.

The 2015 winner will be announced at a gala dinner at the Dairy Women’s Network annual conference on March 19 in Invercargill.

The current Dairy Woman of the year is Northland dairy farmer and chartered accountant Charmaine O’Shea. The current chair of the Dairy Women’s Network trust board, Justine Kidd, was the winner in 2013, and Barbara Kuriger, who last year elected to Parliament as the Taranaki MP, was the winner in 2012.

Here are the four finalists:

Elaine Cook

Cook and her husband progressed through the ranks from lower order sharemilkers to farm owners, starting out in the Waikato and then moving to Southland in 2000.

In 2006, the couple won New Zealand Sharemilker of the Year, having already won the Southland regional title.

In 2008, Cook’s husband died suddenly and the sharemilking business was concluded with Elaine and their three daughters moving back up to the Waikato, however she retained an interested in the South Island dairy industry and in 2011, she became a director of the Southland Demonstration Farm.

In 2013, Cook was named the inaugural associate director to DairyNZ – a six-month appointment – and also holds roles as a strategic director for Young Farmers and chairs the governance committee for two Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment research contracts.

Katie Milne

Milne farms with her partner farm at Rotomanu, Lake Brunner catchment on the West Coast of the South Island. They have a small high BW Jersey herd of 200 cows which are fed on a grass based system. On a separate run-off they rear replacement heifer calves and a localised contracting operation making silage pits, hay, baleage, effluent spreading from ponds, herd homes and stand-off pads, employing one full-time staff member.

Katie has been the West Coast provincial Federated Farmers president since 2008, and holds a position on the national board, where she is spokesperson on adverse events, rural security, local government, ACC and employment.

Andrea Murphy

Originally from Canada, Murphy now lives in Alexandra, in Central Otago.

She owns her own animal nutrition business called Maple Grove Consulting Ltd, but could not pass up the opportunity of working in her dream job as a ruminant nutritionist with PGG Wrightson’s Tech Team.

It was after joining the Dairy Women’s Network’s conference organising committee in 2007 in Invercargill, that Murphy felt she had ‘found her place’ in New Zealand and still attributes the network with the success of Maple Grove Consulting Ltd.
Murphy is involved on the committee for the New Zealand Association of Ruminant Nutrition.

Wilma van Leeuwen

Wilma and her husband have grown their dairy business over the past 29 years to milking 12,000 cows on 12 dairy farms, and started a contracting business in 1996.

In 1993 the couple and their six children moved from the Waikato to Waimate in the South Island. 

There, they installed the first robotic milking system in a freestall
barn system in New Zealand in 2008 and have recently commissioned the largest robotic milking freestall barn in the world, milking 1500 cows with 24 robots.

She is a Van Leeuwen Dairy Group director, director of two other family dairy businesses and a founding shareholder and active secretary of the Waitaki Milk Supply Group and Oceania Milk Supply Group.

For more information on the finalists, awards and the conference, visit www.dwn.co.nz