McIvor moving to OSPRI
Beef + Lamb New Zealand chief executive for the past eight years, Sam McIvor is heading for new pastures at Ospri, which runs NZ’s integrated animal disease management and traceability service.
New Zealand red meat processors and exporters are the latest group to lend their support to the ‘Kiwis Backing Farmers’ campaign.
They claim the only sustainable way for the Government to deliver better outcomes for the environment and the economy is to work with farmers.
The campaign, which has been spearheaded by Beef + Lamb New Zealand (B+LNZ) and rural advocacy group 50 Shades of Green, aims to highlight the cumulative effects of successive policies, such as the wholesale conversion of productive sheep and beef farms into carbon farms, on rural communities.
Meat Industry Association (MIA) chief executive Sirma Karapeeva says New Zealand’s sheep and beef farmers are among the most carbon efficient and environmentally sustainable producers of red meat in the world.
“However, successive waves of new regulation in areas such as freshwater, biodiversity and carbon farming are putting the sheep and beef farmers’ status as champions for the environment at risk,” says Karapeeva.
She says many of the regulations being foisted upon farmers would be better aligned with on-farm practice and are collectively adding unnecessary costs to farmers at a point when inflation and volatile global markets are putting their operations under extreme pressure.
She adds that the meat processing sector is also concerned by the lack of limits on fossil fuel emitters offsetting their emissions by planting trees on productive land.
“This risks pushing more land into carbon forestry, which will have long-term consequences for the viability of rural communities and the New Zealand economy as a whole,” Karapeeva says.
“We all have a deep interest in creating a cleaner, greener environment and a thriving economy, which is why we’re calling on the Government to work with sheep and beef farmers to achieve this.
“As it stands, the red meat sector generates almost $12 billion in earnings from exports to more than 100 countries and employs 92,000 people, and by working together we can grow this in a sustainable way.”
South Waikato farm manager Ben Purua’s amazing transformation from gang life to milking cows was rewarded with the Ahuwhenua Young Maori Farmer award last night.
Bankers have been making record profits in the last few years, but those aren’t the only records they’ve been breaking, says Federated Farmers vice president Richard McIntyre.
The 2023-24 season has been a roller coaster ride for Waikato dairy farmers, according to Federated Farmers dairy section chair, Mathew Zonderop.
Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) director general Ray Smith says job cuts announced this morning will not impact the way the Ministry is organised or merge business units.
Scales Corporation is acquiring a number of orchard assets from Bostock Group.
Family and solidarity shone through at the 75 years of Ferdon sale in Otorohanga last month.