Crazy
OPINION: Your canine crusader was truly impressed by the almost unanimous support given by politicians of all stripes in Parliament to the recent passing of legislation for the NZ/EU free trade deal.
Labour spokesman on primary industries, Damien O’Connor says while the dairy developments at Taupo are impressive it’s important the Crown is not exposed to major debt such as that of Solid Energy.
However O’Connor says he’s impressed with Landcorp’s focus on low cost production systems.
He says the dairy industry in general at present is lacking an overall strategic direction and individuals are making potentially risky decisions.
“There are some players in the industry who are intensifying their systems while others are more cautions and probably winding back their production,” he says.
“That leads to the question of processing capacity in terms of the wider industry and I don’t think anyone would want to see the dairy end up with a meat industry situation where we have excess capacity.”
He notes a number of foreign investors are becoming involved in the dairy processing industry to vertically integrate their systems.
There is real risk of over-capacity becoming a reality in the dairy sector, he says. While some commentators are encouraging farmers to increase production, farmers who don’t focus on profit will go broke and additional production alone doesn’t develop a better outcome.
Trade Minister Todd McClay says New Zealand has no intention of backing down in a trade dispute with Canada over dairy products.
There have been leadership changes at the Hamilton-based Dairy Goat Co-operative, which has been struggling financially in recent years.
Horticulture NZ chief executive Nadine Tunley will step down in August.
OPINION: In recent years farmers have been crying foul of unworkable and expensive regulations.
Another 16 commercial beef farmers have been selected to take part in the Informing New Zealand Beef (INZB) programme designed to help drive the uptake of genetics in the industry.
Trade Minister Todd McClay says Kiwi exporters will be $100 million better off today as the NZ-EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA) comes into force.
OPINION: Canterbury milk processor Synlait is showing no sign of bouncing back from its financial doldrums.
OPINION: It seems every bugger in this country can get an award these days.