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Miles Anderson.
Trade Me says livestock sales are now permitted on its online platform, while New Zealand is at COVID-19 alert level 4.
It says concerns have been raised about animal welfare during lockdown, due to the closure of saleyards around the country.
Trade Me’s head of marketplace Lisa Stewart says the company has worked with both Federated Farmers and the Ministry for Primary Industries to understand the issue.
"With typical public livestock sales closed due to the lockdown, farmers are restricted in how they sell their livestock at this busy time of year,” she says.
Stewart says Trade Me is now a registered essential seller with MPI, so it is able to provide this service to farmers.
“We hope this will help them to move and buy the animals they need during the lockdown,” she says.
Federated Farmers meat & wool chair Miles Anderson says the Trade Me platform will be useful for farmers.
“We’ve got pretty much a perfect storm of factors impacting animal feed – the COVID-19 complications, drought in many parts of the country and under-powered meat processing capability due to lockdown restrictions,” he says.
“Opening up Trade Me to livestock sales and livestock feed sales gives farmers another option to deal with some of the issues they’re facing.”
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