NDDT now webinars

The day-long confererence normally has a keynote address delivered by Fonterra's chairman and is well attended by Northland farmers.

However, due to Covid, this year's conference will run as four evening sessions via Zoom later this month.

Fonterra chairman Peter McBride will address one of the webinars, giving a global outlook for New Zealand farmers.

Another session will see Ministry for Primary Industries chief science advisor John Roche look at the future of dairy farming both overseas and in NZ, particularly in the changing climate and greenhouse gas regulatory environment. Some of the questions he will address are:

• Are NZ farmers well placed to face the future?
• What do we need to change?
• And what is happening overseas that we should know about?

Agriculture economist Susan Kilsby will talk on how NZ agriculture fits in with the rest of the world.

Topics she will cover include political pressure, interest rates and inflation.

The fourth webinar will be a science session looking at NDDT's Future Farm Systems trial updates and other scientific topics.

The current project commenced June 2021 and compares the productivity, profitability and impact on people and the environment on three farms:

According to the latest NDDT farm trial update, dry conditions and 10cm soil temperatures in the range of 22-30 degrees have dropped grass growth rates and cover further.

Palm kernel expeller (PKE) is being fed to milk within fat evaluation index (FEI) limits on the Current and Alternative Pasture farms. Baleage is also being fed now as pasture intakes are dropping.

The Low Emissions farm is feeding home grown baleage but this will reduce or halt if kikuyu growth lifts as residuals will rise quickly.

"Alternative Pasture cows continue to milk better than the other farms due to significantly higher ME and crude protein content compared to kikuyu pastures."