Farmers' call
OPINION: Fonterra's $4.22 billion consumer business sale to Lactalis is ruffling a few feathers outside the dairy industry.
OPINION: One particular bone the Hound has been gnawing on for years now is how the chattering classes want it both ways when it comes to the success of NZ's dairy industry.
When it's bad news - water quality, losses when commodity prices crash, etc. - the loudmouths are very clear that it's "their" (the industry's) problem.
But when they feel domestic butter prices are too high, or that Fonterra shouldn't "sell the family jewels", it's suddenly "our milk" and "our industry".
So, note to those like Helen Clark who suddenly have an opinion on Fonterra's business decisions - this is not China and Fonterra is not the property of some communist bureaucracy, it's a privately owned business.
The only ones who get to decide if they should sell assets are the ones who built those assets with blood, sweat and tears!
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