Cuddling cows
OPINION: Years of floods and low food prices have driven a dairy farm in England's northeast to stop milking its cows and instead charge visitors to cuddle them.
OPINION: Microbes fished from the stomachs of cows can gobble up certain kinds of plastic, including the polythylene terephthalate (PET) used in soda bottles, food packaging and synthetic fabrics.
Scientists from University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, in Vienna, uncovered that these microbes in liquid that was drawn from the rumen, the largest compartment of a ruminant's stomach.
Ruminants, such as cows, rely on microorganisms to help break down their diet of coarse vegetation. The rumen acts as an incubator for these microbes, which either digest or ferment foods consumed by a cow or other ruminant.
The researchers suspect that some microbes lurking in a cow's rumen should be capable of digesting polyesters, substances whose component molecules are linked by so-called ester groups. That's because, due to their herbivorous diets, cows consume a natural polyester produced by plants, called cutin.
Labour's agriculture spokesperson Jo Luxton says while New Zealand needs more housing, sacrificing our best farmland to get there is not the answer.
Profitability issues facing arable farmers are the same across the world, says New Zealand's special agricultural trade envoy Hamish Marr.
Over 85% of Fonterra farmer suppliers will be eligible for customer funding up to $1,500 for solutions designed to drive on-farm efficiency gains and reduce emissions intensity.
Tighter beef and lamb production globally have worked to the advantage of NZ, according to the Meat Industry Association (MIA).
Groundswell is ramping up its 'Quit Paris' campaign with signs going up all over the country.
Some farmers in the Nelson region are facing up to five years of hard work to repair their damaged properties caused by the recent devastating floods.
OPINION: Years of floods and low food prices have driven a dairy farm in England's northeast to stop milking its…
OPINION: An animal activist organisation is calling for an investigation into the use of dairy cows in sexuallly explicit content…