Feds support live animal exports
Federated Farmers have reiterated their support for the coalition Government to abolish the present ban on the live export of animals.
OPINION: It appears the only people surprised by plummeting levels of rural confidence are the Government and Ag Minister Damien O’Connor.
For months we have seen an endless stream of reports – from Rabobank, BNZ, ANZ, NZIER – all depicting a growing lack of confidence and concern in rural New Zealand.
Only last month, an open letter was written to the Government by an agricultural consultancy head, Chris Garland, outlining why farmer morale is at an all-time low. Garland, of Baker Ag, called for more consideration for the rural sector’s lot in the face of ever more onerous regulation.
“This Government’s approach to environmental policy is undermining the mental health and wellbeing of the pastoral sector,” he explained.
Showing just how out of touch O’Connor is with the current feeling in the rural heartland, his response to the letter was a ridiculous tweet blaming the rural media and farm advisors for the current rural malaise.
“If farm advisors and rural media weren’t so keen to repeat negative political rhetoric farmers might feel appreciated,” he claimed.
Really, minister? Your answer is to blame the rural media but you need to take a closer look in the mirror.
O’Connor and his Government should be basking in the glory of strong commodity prices and a positive outlook for the primary sector. Instead the Government is confronted with a rural sector that is as worried and despondent as during the reforms of the Rogernomics era in the mid-1980s.
In the latest Rabobank survey, farmers overwhelmingly cited Government policy and intervention as the key reason they expect the agri economy to deteriorate during the next 12 months. The bank described this as: “a level never seen before in the history of this survey”.
The two main Government policies causing the most worry in rural NZ are the impending Zero Carbon Bill and how agricultural emissions will be treated, and the proposed amendments to NZ’s freshwater regulations.
Instead of lashing out at the rural media and others in the sector for relaying exactly how farmers are now feeling, Damien O’Connor should take ownership of his Government’s actions and polices as the real reason for the waning levels of confidence down on the farm.
Following a recent overweight incursion that saw a Mid-Canterbury contractor cop a $12,150 fine, the rural contracting industry is calling time on what they consider to be outdated and unworkable regulations regarding weight and dimensions that they say are impeding their businesses.
Trade Minister Todd McClay says his officials plan to meet their US counterparts every month from now on to better understand how the 15% tariff issue there will play out, and try and get some certainty there for our exporters about the future.
A landmark New Zealand trial has confirmed what many farmers have long suspected - that strategic spring nitrogen use not only boosts pasture growth but delivers measurable gains in lamb growth and ewe condition.
It was recently announced that former MP and Southland farmer Eric Roy has stepped down of New Zealand Pork after seven years. Leo Argent talks with Eric about his time at the organisation and what the future may hold.
It's critical that the horticulture sector works together as part of a goal to double the sector’s exports by 2035.
RaboResearch, the research arm of specialist agriculture industry banker Rabobank, sees positives for the Alliance Group in its proposed majority-stake sale to Ireland's Dawn Meats.
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