Record Kiwifruit Harvest Brings Optimism, but Green Growers Face Profitability Challenges
Signs for the 2026-27 kiwifruit crop look good, but there are still some challenges for growers – especially those who produce green kiwifruit.
Zespri's SunGold or G3, has been named as fruit and vegetable product of the year by one of Germany's most important grocery trade publications.
Zespri's SunGold or G3, has been named as fruit and vegetable product of the year by Lebensmittel Praxis, one of Germany's most important grocery trade publications.
The award, which is based on a broad survey of consumers living in Germany aged between 18 and 65, had apparently only been won previously by vegetable products.
Zespri's marketing manager for Germany, Andreas Borgers, says they are really happy about this award, because it shows that we can inspire those who consume our products.
"Our goal for 2016 is to give more people the opportunity to try our Zespri SunGold, because taste and quality speak for themselves. Naturally that also means substantial potential sales for our trade partners," he says.
Borgers says in Germany a total of 65 promoters gave away around 165,000 individual SunGold kiwifruits to people in Dusseldorf, Hamburg and Berlin during special tasting events in May, June and July respectively.
He says these tastings were accompanied by wide-reaching PR and advertising campaigns, the latter featuring billboards, radio and television spots, collaborations with print and online media, social media promotions and other tactics described intriguingly by the company as 'guerilla activities'.
New Zealand dairy farmers are set to be the first in the world to receive access to a new digital physical milk pricing tool that enables them to fix the price for their physical milk.
State farmer Pāmu is opening its farm gates this summer in an effort to give the rural sector the opportunity to see how large-scale, multi-system farming is delivering productivity and profitability across New Zealand.
A five-year study has found that the cost of reducing emissions without technology may be significant and unsustainable for Northland dairy farmers.
DairyNZ says Waikato farmers need certainty on Plan Change 1, but they say that certainty must be matched with practical, workable rules and a clear transition that doesn't get ahead of the new resource management system currently under review.
While the Government has moved quickly to make commercial hauliers' lot easier during the current fuel crisis, they appear to be stuck in the creep box when it comes to the agricultural industry.
Waikato farmers have been told that the Government’s new planning system legislation and the region’s Plan Change 1 (PC1) “won’t mesh together very well”.

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