Buyer for VLG assets
The New Zealand Rural Land Company (NZL) says it has entered conditional agreements to buy assets from the Van Leeuwen Group (VGL), which went into receivership last week.
The owners of one of New Zealand's largest dairy operations, the Van Leeuwen Dairy Group, say the operation is alive and well.
Adriaan and Wilma van Leeuwen told Dairy News by email from overseas that the South Canterbury business is not in receivership, as rumoured.
They also had heard this rumour, on RNZ National radio, but say it is "false". The group has 12 holdings and 12,000 dairy cows, and is the world's largest robotic milking farm. Last year it expanded by installing 24 Lely robots in three barns of 500 cows each.
Adriaan and Wilma also made the Rich List last year with wealth estimated at $65 million.
Federated Farmers president Wayne Langford says the 2025 Fieldays has been one of more positive he has attended.
A fundraiser dinner held in conjunction with Fieldays raised over $300,000 for the Rural Support Trust.
Recent results from its 2024 financial year has seen global farm machinery player John Deere record a significant slump in the profits of its agricultural division over the last year, with a 64% drop in the last quarter of the year, compared to that of 2023.
An agribusiness, helping to turn a long-standing animal welfare and waste issue into a high-value protein stream for the dairy and red meat sector, has picked up a top innovation award at Fieldays.
The Fieldays Innovation Award winners have been announced with Auckland’s Ruminant Biotech taking out the Prototype Award.
Following twelve years of litigation, a conclusion could be in sight of Waikato’s controversial Plan Change 1 (PC1).
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