NZ household food waste falls again
Kiwis are wasting less of their food than they were two years ago, and this has been enough to push New Zealand’s total household food waste bill lower, the 2025 Rabobank KiwiHarvest Food Waste survey has found.
Tools such as Farm IQ and other farming data collection tools are increasingly important to sheep producers, Blake Holgate believes.
“We can use that information to understand our system better, understand how we are producing our lambs and then we are able to manipulate it accordingly,” the Rabobank analyst told Rural News.
He says once farmers get more understanding of, for example, particular generic traits or productions systems they can start to tinker with it at that level.
Holgate believes a key take-out of the report is that farmers have started on this journey, but more investment and focus on adding value is required.
Three points are important to positioning NZ lamb as a premium high quality protein. It starts with having a consistent, high quality product.
“We can’t take for granted the quality of products; we must ensure we give consumers a high quality eating experience,” Holgate explains.
“But on top of that, if you want a premium high-value product you must also give consumers the story behind it. They want to know how and when it was produced [and what contributed to its] sustainable, ethical production.
“The grass-fed story will be an important aspect of that. Some attributes of 100% grass-fed tick some boxes for consumers so we must make them aware of that.
“But we must also have strong, robust traceability programmes and accreditation schemes so we become a trusted supplier to consumers overseas, so that what we say they believe and see as credible.”
Holgate says we can no longer rely on the good, longstanding reputation of NZ lamb.
“Competition is greater globally, both from other lamb producers starting to do this storytelling themselves, and with the rise and greater worldwide availability of low cost proteins like poultry or pork.
“There is also a pending threat of synthetic proteins and their messaging about traditional livestock production – the ethical and environmental sustainability aspects. We need to start countering that with positive messaging and correcting some of those stories.”
He says lamb sits well in targeting premium consumers because it is a reasonably scarce protein worldwide.
“If you tried to do the same with chicken it would be a lot harder; we are able to differentiate and articulate a premium story about lamb and we can do that because of the scarcity.
“It probably feeds well into the greenhouse gases story about a low carbon footprint.”
Also, health and the 100% grass-fed message sits well with its perceived benefits.
“Our processors over the last five years have done good work starting to develop these value-added lines in products and are doing more consumer research.”
Much outlined in the Rabobank report is a continuation or extension of work already underway, Holgate says.
An independent report, prepared for Alliance farmer shareholders is backing the proposed $250 million joint venture investment by Irish company Dawn Meats Group.
Whangarei field service technician, Bryce Dickson has cemented his place in John Deere’s history, becoming the first ever person to win an award for the third time at the annual Australian and New Zealand Technician of the Year Awards, announced at a gala dinner in Brisbane last night.
NZPork has appointed Auckland-based Paul Bucknell as its new chair.
The Government claims to have delivered on its election promise to protect productive farmland from emissions trading scheme (ETS) but red meat farmers aren’t happy.
Foot and Mouth Disease outbreaks could have a detrimental impact on any country's rural sector, as seen in the United Kingdom's 2000 outbreak that saw the compulsory slaughter of over six million animals.
The Ministry for the Environment is joining as a national award sponsor in the Ballance Farm Environment Awards (BFEA from next year).
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