OPINION: Beef + Lamb NZ's annual meeting will be an interesting affair this year in a number of ways.

A case of atypical bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in Brazil has resulted in temporary export suspensions from that country - as well as renewed international calls for increased transparency.

The Mycoplasma bovis eradication programme has reached a big milestone with the depopulation of all confirmed infected properties in the stubborn pocket of infection in mid-Canterbury.

Winning the East Coast FMG Young Farmer of the Year title hasn't sunk in for Patoka farmer Patrick Crawshaw.

Fonterra farmers are picking up the tab of about 30 fellow shareholders forced to dry off due to damage caused by Cyclone Gabrielle.

Ireland's Minister of Agriculture, Food and Marine blew the whistle just moments after he and NZ's Minister of Agriculture Damien O'Connor concluded their formal talks in Wellington.

Beef + Lamb New Zealand says it is open to providing farmers with "additional comfort" around how it balances the needs of all levy payers.

Beef + Lamb NZ chair Andrew Morrison has been dumped and will stand down at this week's annual meeting (Thursday March 30).

Traditional spreading via tankers or umbilical systems have typically discharged effluent onto splash-plates, resulting in small droplet sizes, which in turn lead to odours, but probably more importantly, the loss of nitrogen by volatilisation.

A Taranaki couple that took an unconventional route into dairy farming is proving there is more than one way to blaze a trail.