Tuesday, 03 May 2022 07:55

Plantain can reduce N leaching

Written by  Staff Reporters
DairyNZ's Francesca Bennett with plantain. DairyNZ's Francesca Bennett with plantain.

Trials are showing that plantain has the potential to reduce nitrate leaching by more than 20%, says David Burger, DairyNZ general manager sustainable dairy.

He made the comments after visiting the Tararua Plantain Project last week with Agriculture Minister Damien O'Connor.

The project is a DairyNZ-led project working with partner organisations, local farmers and the local community to improve water quality.

It supports farmers in adopting plantain on their farms, testing the benefits in local pastures and sharing the lessons with other farmers. Project partners are DairyNZ, Agricom, MPI, Fonterra and Nestlé. Delivery partners include AgResearch, Horizons and Massey University.

Burger says plantain in pastures is showing great promise to improve waterways by reducing nitrate leaching.

"This project has community at its heart as it seeks environmental improvements," he says.

Burger says farmers involved in the project care about their local waterways and have improved their streams already through their own ongoing farm actions.

"It aims to ensure the dairy sector continues as an economic pillar within the local community. Plantain is a potential solution New Zealand wide."

The project has so far attracted 66 dairy farms in the Tararua District in Wairarapa.

It is likely more farms will adopt plantain this autumn (2022), though the numbers are yet to be confirmed.

Burger says these farmers are incorporating plantain on their farms and helping scientists assess the benefits and practice change needed.

"We aim to have 118 farms involve in this project. Monitoring programmes have been set up by DairyNZ on several participating Tararua dairy farms to measure plantain productivity and report on Tararua water quality.

"The Tararua Plantain Project builds on the findings of a DairyNZ-led cross-sector research programme, forages for reduced nitrate leaching.

"This programme showed plantain has the potential to reduce nitrate leaching by more than 20%."

Water Project

The Tararua Plantain Project water quality day was held last week at Norsewood.

DairyNZ says the day was about sharing dairy farmers' contribution to improving water quality and hearing from others including iwi on how the whole community can play a role.

Invitees include Agriculture Minister Damien O'Connor, Tararua District Mayor Tracey Collis, DairyNZ, Mavis Mullins (project chair and part of the local hapu), hapu representative Hone Morris, Horizons WQ scientist, Mike Patterson.

More like this

Featured

Dr Mike Joy says sorry, escapes censure

Academic Dr Mike Joy and his employer, Victoria University of Wellington have apologised for his comments suggesting that dairy industry CEOs should be hanged for contributing towards nitrate poisoning of waterways.

People-first philosophy pays off

The team meeting at the Culverden Hotel was relaxed and open, despite being in the middle of calving when stress levels are at peak levels, especially in bitterly cold and wet conditions like today.

Farmer anger over Joy's social media post

A comment by outspoken academic Dr Mike Joy suggesting that dairy industry leaders should be hanged for nitrate contamination of drinking/groundwater has enraged farmers.

From Nelson to Dairy Research: Amy Toughey’s Journey

Driven by a lifelong passion for animals, Amy Toughey's journey from juggling three jobs with full-time study to working on cutting-edge dairy research trials shows what happens when hard work meets opportunity - and she's only just getting started.

National

Machinery & Products

JDLink Boost for NZ farms

Connectivity is widely recognised as one of the biggest challenges facing farmers, but it is now being overcome through the…

New generation Defender HD11

The all-new 2026 Can-Am Defender HD11 looks likely to raise the bar in the highly competitive side-by-side category.

» Latest Print Issues Online

Milking It

Buttery prize

OPINION: Westland Milk may have won the contract to supply butter to Costco NZ but Open Country Dairy is having…

Gene Bill rumours

OPINION: The Gene Technology Bill has divided the farming community with strong arguments on both the pros and cons of…

» Connect with Dairy News

» eNewsletter

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter