Make vets part of your management team
Farmers are being urged to make their veterinarians an integral part of their farm management team.
Massey University professor Velmurugu (Ravi) Ravindran has been awarded the New Zealand Society of Animal Production’s McMeekan Memorial Award, the country’s highest honour for a production animal scientist.
The award is given only to an outstanding individual or group worthy of the honour; it was last awarded in 2013.
Ravindran, from Massey’s Institute of Veterinary, Animal and Biomedical Sciences, specialises in poultry nutrition, with emphasis on nutrient metabolism, feed enzymes, feed evaluation, amino acid availability, gut flora management and early nutrition in poultry.
Senior lecturer Dr Nicola Schreurs, who nominated professor Ravindran for the award, says his strong ties with the industry have allowed for rapid advances in technology.
“The progressiveness of the poultry industry is attributable to the work that Ravi has done.
“He is also widely acknowledged as a researcher who laid the foundations for much of the current understanding of feed enzyme technology. This is becoming more critical in the current context of sustainability – maximising the utilisation of available feed resources and lowering the environmental impact from animal production.”
The McMeekan Memorial Award honours Dr Harold McMeeken, a distinguished leader in animal production research and administration in NZ and worldwide.
He influenced NZ agricultural research and the development of Ruakura as a world renowned research centre.
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.