New leaders for Insurance Council
The Insurance Council of New Zealand (ICNZ) has appointed a new president and vice-president.
INSURANCE CLAIMS persist in Taranaki after two major storms hit the province in three weeks. The first extensively damaged dairy farms around Waverley and Patea, and one last week hit farmers in the north of the province.
FMG chief executive Chris Black told Dairy News that 1200 claims have been lodged as of last week and they keep coming. Staff have visited about 600 clients to assess damage. Some rebuilding is beginning but much clean-up work remains to be done, especially fallen shelter belts that have blocked tracks and damaged fences.
The clean-up of trees will take heavy machinery and time, Black says. "There's also quite a bit of corrugated iron in paddocks."
He says FMG is getting claims from all around the North Island because of the floods and high winds of the past week – from Northland, Wairarapa, East Coast and Waikato.
"Most of this is for farm buildings and dwellings damaged by the wind rather than flooding."
Meanwhile Federated Farmers and DairyNZ, trying to help farmers when the big storm struck three weeks ago, say one of the biggest problems was communications when the power was cut.
Craig McBeth, DairyNZ, says it was pointless referring people to their website, or telephoning them, because there was no power. In the end they had to rely on news media to relay their key messages.
Derek Gibson, Feds, says they had similar problems. But the storm has raised farmers' awareness of the need for contingency plans for such events. Small generators able to power pumps for watering stock are affordable to most farmers, he says. Not so large generators for running dairy sheds.
"It can cost up to $25,000 for a generator that will run all the infrastructure on a dairy farm. One to run just a shed would cost about $12,000."
McBeth and Gibson urge farmers to work with friends and neighbours to share equipment and plan to deal with major events, especially during the first day or so.
The 2023-24 season has been a roller coaster ride for Waikato dairy farmers, according to Federated Farmers dairy section chair, Mathew Zonderop.
Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) director general Ray Smith says job cuts announced this morning will not impact the way the Ministry is organised or merge business units.
Scales Corporation is acquiring a number of orchard assets from Bostock Group.
Family and solidarity shone through at the 75 years of Ferdon sale in Otorohanga last month.
The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) has informed staff it will cut 391 jobs following a consultation period.
New Zealand farmers are committed to making their businesses more resilient to climate change and are embracing innovation to help them do so.
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