increase font size
Dairy Environment Leaders (DEL) forum chair Melissa Slattery says this week’s event will be filled with good information and future thinking.
The Dairy Environment Leaders (DEL) forum taking place in Wellington later this week is set to be an event filled with good information and future thinking, says DEL chair Melissa Slattery.
Slattery, a Te Aroha dairy farmer, says she joined the DEL forum after being invited to attend a gathering in Wellington a few years ago.
“I really enjoyed it, got a lot from it and increased my network of farmers and also met different stakeholders and speakers and got exposed to different information which is always cool,” she told Dairy News.
This year’s forum has a whole host of speakers with a range of insights, from former All Black Sir Buck Shelford who is set to discuss leadership and getting the most out of teams, to KPMG NZ global head of agribusiness Ian Proudfoot talking about the concept of the ‘conscious consumer’.
“We’ve got information on methane technology, all sorts of science and policy, and a political panel,” Slattery says.
She says there are multiple benefits to attending the forum, including “networking with like-minded farmers, learning more about markets and what’s happening worldwide”.
Slattery says that, with 300 dairy environment leaders throughout New Zealand, the network of farmers aim to influence farmers on-farm and in their community, but they also try to advocate for farmers at a policy level.
“We do that by showcasing leadership on-farm for environmental stewardship, helping make practical solutions from a regulatory side of things and supporting communities and other farmers on the journey,” she says.
She says that in 2023 the network is aiming to grow its group of farmers and the impact it can create in the community.
The DEL forum will take place 22-23 March 2023 in Wellington, with more than 60 leaders expected to attend.
OPINION: In the 1980s, concern was expressed in West Germany about the falling birth rate. Some simple analysis was performed by Professor Helmut Sies, physician and biochemist at Dusseldorf University. His letter ‘A new parameter for sex education’ was published in Nature in 1988:
OPINION: Dairy farmers know better than anyone that change is constant.
A four year trial has reaffirmed that mixing plantain into dairy pastures can help reduce nitrogen losses to freshwater while maintaining milk production and profitability, say researchers.
OPINION: Today marks Farm Worker Appreciation Day – a day we’re proud to recognise here in New Zealand.
OPINION: Mike Chapman, former chief executive of levy-funded HortNZ, has thrown out a challenge to farmers and growers to put their levy-funded industry organisations under the same scrutiny as fertiliser, electricity, labour and freight.
State farmer Pamu has delivered its strongest operating result on record.
Four years since it was first detected in New Zealand, researchers and growers now know much more about management of maize pest fall armyworm (FAW).
The Government has announced it will pause key parts of Waikato Plan Change 1 (PC1) in a decision that is set to give Waikato farmers a reprieve from new consenting and farm-planning requirements while the wider resource management system is overhauled.
OPINION: The time has come for the Government to back the organic sector.
Plan ahead and be patient. That’s the message to farmers and horticulturalists from the chairman of the NZ Agricultural Aviation Association, Kent Weir.
The industry is crying out for graduates with agricultural related degrees.
OPINION: After hogging the media limelight for telling a NZ Chinese MP to "go back home", Winston Peters has decided…
OPINION: With fuel prices soaring, one would have expected most farmers to be reclaiming excise duty on petrol.
