Fonterra, Sharesies join to make share trading easier
Fonterra is teaming up with wealth app provider Sharesies to make it easier for its farmer shareholders to trade co-op shares among themselves.
Fonterra chairman John Monaghan says a lot of work goes into delivering a globally competitive milk price to farmers.
“A competitive milk price doesn’t just happen,” he told the Fonterra annual meeting in Lichfield yesterday.
He reminded the 400 shareholders at the meeting that last year’s farmgate milk price was $6.69/kgMS, third highest in a decade.
Sales outside the Global Dairy Trade (GDT) platform added 10c/kgMS to the payout last year; GDT sales account for 42% of milk price auction.
The combination of these sales and Fonterra’s ability to keep milk price costs below the rate of inflation, equates to an additional $750 million paid to farmers every year in higher milk prices, says Monaghan.
Monaghan pointed out that there had been a “structural change” in local milk prices since Fonterra was formed.
“We’ve gone from being paid about half as much as our global peers to the point now where we are consistently paid the same or thereabouts.
“It sounds arrogant to say it, but the fact is that simply never would have happened without a strong Fonterra.
“For a time this year, NZ farmers were paid the highest milk price in the world.”
A higher milk price poses a challenge to Fonterra’s ingredients and consumer and foodservice businesses; they were competing on price against US and European dairy giants that had lower input costs.
Federated Farmers president Wayne Langford is claiming “some real success” on the 12 policy priorities it placed before the Coalition Government.
Federated Farmers is throwing its support behind the Fast-track Approvals Bill introduced by the Coalition Government to enable a fast-track decision-making process for infrastructure and development projects.
The latest report from ANZ isn’t good news for sheep farmers: lamb returns are forecast to remain low.
Divine table grapes that herald the start of a brand-new industry in Hawke’s Bay have been coming off vines in Maraekakaho.
In what appears to be a casualty of the downturn in the agricultural sector, a well-known machinery brand is now in the hands of liquidators and owing creditors $6.6 million.
One of New Zealand’s deepest breeder Jersey herds – known for its enduring connection through cattle with the UK’s longest reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II – will host its 75th anniversary celebration sale on-farm on April 22.