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Silver Fern Farms chair Rob Hewett.
Farming cooperatives have dominated the awards made this year by Cooperative Business New Zealand (CBNZ).
This body represents industries whose members run as co-ops, e.g. agriculture, manufacturing, insurance, banking and other financial services, utilities, education, health, wholesale and retail.
Farming co-ops won three of the four main awards announced at CBNZ’s awards night.
The Hokitika dairy co-op Westland Milk Products won the 2018 Co-operative Business of the Year award, for “a significant and positive impact within the co-operative community during the 2017-18 year”.
The judges said this recognised Westland having successfully reinvented itself using the co-op model as a strength, and promoting to its customers its productive relationship with its 350 shareholding farmers. The award “celebrated the success of the co-operative business model”.
The chairman of Livestock Improvement Corporation (LIC), Murray King, of Nelson, was named the Co-operative Leader of the Year, recognised for his “exceptional leadership while steering the agri-tech co-op through a long period of disruption and uncertainty”.
CBNZ chief executive Craig Presland said the LIC board had reviewed its capital structure to devise a simpler, fairer share structure while protecting its cooperative principles.
Agricultural services co-op Farmlands and meat processing co-op Silver Fern Farms jointly won the ‘Co-operation Amongst Cooperatives’ award, for working together to foster future farming leaders.
The two co-ops run three-day governance training events called To the Core; this enables shareholders to learn how their co-ops work and to develop their leadership skills.
Silver Fern Farms chair Rob Hewett said Farmlands had been the ideal partner in To the Core, which Silver Ferns started in 2016.
“It touches on the important parts of being a director, such as finance and health and safety and strategy, and gets us focused on what matters for the future.”
A fourth award, for Outstanding Co-operative Contribution, went to Foodstuffs executive Kim DeGarnham, who became Foodstuffs South Island’s first woman manager in 1996.
CBNZ says co-ops employ at least 48,000 NZers, make up about 20% of NZ’s GDP and turn over about NZ$43 billion a year.
Canterbury farmer Andy Macfarlane has been appointed to the board of AgriZeroNZ, the public-private partnership designed to accelerate the development and deployment of emissions reduction tools for New Zealand farmers.
As dairy farmers lock in plans for the upcoming mating season, a partnership between Fonterra and Silver Fern Farms has been formed with the aim of making it simpler to create additional value from calves not entering the replacement herd.
Applications for Silver Fern Farms Co-operative's next board-appointed farmer director are open.
Silver Fern Farms has tackled the ongoing war-induced shipping challenges to mideast markets by airlifting 90 tonnes of chilled New Zealand lamb and beef to the United Arab Emirates.
Silver Fern Farms has successfully produced and delivered 90 tonnes of premium chilled New Zealand lamb and beef to the United Arab Emirates via airfreight.
Potatoes New Zealand has congratulated Peter Reynolds of TA Reynolds Ltd in Pukekohe on being awarded the Horticulture New Zealand Bledisloe Cup, recognising a lifetime of service and contribution to New Zealand horticulture.
Signing up to a benchmarking tool is not about competition, but about improving collectively, says Ximena Puig and Alvaro Luzardo who are 50-50 sharemilkers at a 164-hectare (effective) dairy farm in Eketāhuna in the Lower North Island.
A leading British farming politician says he's impressed with the positive attitude of New Zealand farmers that he met during his recent trip here.
OPINION: With 10,500 dairy farms, New Zealand continues to punch above its weight around the world.
The Southern Dairy Hub (SDH), which runs a demonstration farm for South Island farmers, has a new general manager.
Esther Guy-Meakin has been announced as the new chief executive of the New Zealand Meat Board (NZMB).
