Silver Fern Farms roadshow highlights global demand
The second event in the Silver Fern Farms ‘Pasture to Plate Roadshow’ landed in Feilding last week, headed by chair and King Country farmer, Anna Nelson, and chief executive Dan Boulton.
Your old mate reckons former Silver Fern Farms sales manager Grant Howie has done a poacher-turned-gamekeeper conversion since he left the meat company to do business on his own account.
Howie in his former life was the chief salesman of red meat products on behalf of SFF. However, earlier this year the former meat man took over the The Craft Meat Company in Dunedin and has recently hit the supermarket shelves with a plant-based ‘No Meat Mince’’ with ingredients such as mushrooms, tomatoes, almonds, coconut oil and soy protein. Howie, a 30-year food industry veteran, said the rise of alternative proteins was arguably the biggest trend in Western food. This old mutt wonders what Howie’s ex-colleagues and former farmer suppliers at SFF think of his new venture.
Federated Farmers says it is cautiously welcoming signals from the Government that a major shake-up of local government is on its way.
Ashburton cropping and dairy farmer Matthew Paton has been elected to the board of rural services company, Ruralco.
The global agricultural landscape has entered a new phase where geopolitics – not only traditional market forces – will dictate agricultural trade flows, prices, and production decisions.
National Lamb Day is set to return in 2026 with organisers saying the celebrations will be bigger than ever.
Fonterra has dropped its forecast milk price mid-point by 50c as a surge in global milk production is putting downward pressure on commodity prices.
The chance of a $10-plus milk price for this season appears to be depleting.

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