A MULTI-STAKEHOLDER group working on ways to protect the Waikato and Waipa rivers has begun a series of field trips to help them understand the wider community's issues and perspectives.

A TARANAKI farm owned by four Maori trusts scooped the prestigious Ahuwhenua Trophy BNZ Maori Excellence in Farming trophy.

It is the wine that made New Zealand famous. More than a billion glasses of it are poured overseas every year. It is by far our largest export earner, estimated to bring in $1 billion annually.

Making great wine requires patience. Even if you get the combination of soil type, climate and grape variety right, it’s three years until your first crop, and a lot longer until the vines are performing at their best.

Waipara may be emerging from one of its wettest harvests in memory, but this hasn’t dampened the spirits of many of its winegrowers. Despite the recent inclement weather they’re remaining upbeat as the region enters what they consider to be a new and exciting era.

In 2013 there were more new vineyard developments in Marlborough, than there had been in the four years preceding it. And it appears that the coming 12 months are going to see even more planting, if the latest vine nursery survey figures are anything to go by.

Selling multiple pallets of a particular wine is great for any business, in reputation and cash-flow, but it does not automatically catapult a wine into cult status; there’s much more than a good sales record involved in that.

WITHIN 50 years dung beetles will inhabit the whole country, says Shaun Forgie, the Landcare Research scientist working with the Dung Beetle Release Strategy Group.

IT IS widely known that feeding good quality colostrum to calves as soon as possible after birth helps provide immunity to disease in the first 4-6 weeks of life. 

VOLVO PLANS an ‘inside-out’ car launching over the next three months.