You can’t negoitate with eco-terrorists

ENOUGH IS enough! That’s our message to the nutter or nutters responsible for the latest food safety scare to hit the dairy industry.

Whoever sent those anonymous letters containing white powder laced with high concentrations of 1080 to Federated Farmers and Fonterra three months ago is an eco-terrorist; this person or persons must be hunted down and face the full force of the law.

The perpetrator is bound to fail; there is no place in the society for such zealots. If you have a problem with 1080, take your gripe to the courts; stop threatening our country’s reputation.

This attempted sabotage affects not only dairy farmers, who work tirelessly to ensure safe, high quality raw milk leaves their farms every day for the processing plants. It has also affected processors striving to maintain premium quality – the entrepreneurs competing with global traders to ensure consumers feed New Zealand infant formula to their babies.

This 1080 scare has instilled fear and anxiety in parents and grandparents. Is this what the nutter/nutters wanted to achieve?

Let’s look at 1080. The authorities consider it safe to use, but there are conservationists and hunters who would like to see this pesticide banned. Fortunately most conservationists and hunters take a balanced view; one or two may choose to spend days and nights squatting in a kauri tree to prevent its destruction, but we doubt any would condone putting poison in baby milk powder.

New Zealand sells $440 million of infant formula to international markets each year, representing 3% of our total dairy exports. At times like these we say thank God for our stringent checks and balances on food safety.

The international markets buying our infant formula were given a heads up before authorities went public with the threat last week, and so far it’s business as usual in most markets. These markets – crucially the lucrative Chinese market— have faith in our food safety systems; rigorous workplace practices are ensuring the integrity of our products.

However, some countries, like Sri Lanka, have used such cases to slap bans on our milk products. Such countries are intent on gaining a competitive advantage over our milk products.

Also, other infant formula producers worldwide will be keeping a close eye on developments. While no commercial infant formula producers will condone such a hoax, some will end up benefiting from this latest case.

The Government, Fonterra, the dairy industry and retailers are banking on our food safety credentials to see us through. We’re confident that after a possible knee-jerk reaction parents’ confidence will bounce back too.

Will the latest report into the red meat sector by the MIE Group prove to be anything but another doorstop?

THE MEAT Industry Excellence Group’s (MIE) much-vaunted and so far highly secretive report into meat sector reforms is due to be released later this month.

No one can accuse MIE and its supporters of lacking passion or determination, and their initial efforts in rousing farmer support and getting endorsed candidates onto the boards of Alliance Group and Silver Fern Farm is commendable.

However, passion and understanding aside, this knotty question remains: given all the huffing and puffing by MIE, what real and tangible reforms will it actually achieve? The reality is that getting a couple of directors onto meat co-ops’ boards, and increasing voter turnout among apathetic suppliers is nice – but it doesn’t mean much.

Not long ago MIE’s predecessor ginger group MIAG (Meat Industry Action Group) was calling for similar meat sector reforms and even got a number of endorsed candidates onto the boards of Alliance and SFF.

And what happened? MIAG’s leader gave up and went dairy farming, while its meat company directors either retired or got voted off the boards and nothing has changed in the ensuing years!

MIE claims it has… “strong farmer support for a new processing and marketing co-operative with much greater scale…. There is clearly a groundswell and we need to get on with it.”

But will this ‘groundswell’ translate into actual support forMIE’s recommendations for reform when they are finally published? Especially when it requires farmers to dig into their own pockets to pay for industry consolidation (read plant closedown) and reduces their opportunity to shop around?

And how will farmers feel about the lack of capacity in the industry when they are desperate to get stock killed in a dry year?

No doubt all will be revealed when the MIE report is published.

While admiration for the group’s efforts and work are one thing, one gets the uneasy feeling that this latest effort at meat sector reforms will just turn out to be another doorstop – with a $200,000 price tag.

It would be good to be proven wrong, but the history of the New Zealand meat industry is littered with good intentions and dozens of ‘change reports’.

Don’t hold your breath.

Quad bike safety is a major issue for NZ farmers

THE SAFER Farms initiative, recently introduced by WorkSafe NZ, is a timely one.

Since 2008, 120 people have been killed working on farms in New Zealand: four times more people died on farms last year than in forestry or construction. Figures show that someone is killed on a farm every fortnight; this is a shameful record and it must change.

Improving farmer awareness and understanding of risks involved, along with education on how these risks can be minimised and/or managed, is a more effective and better approach to changing these appalling statistics than dishing out heavy-handed fines.

While farmers may strongly believe in personal responsibility, rather than having ‘big brother’ telling them what to do, they have an inherent intolerance of bureaucracy and attending to endless compliance documents. Still they need to clean up their collective act.

The stats don’t lie. Far too many farmers, farm workers and their families are killed and/or hurt on our country’s farms every year. There is no excuse for the poor safety record these statistics show. Any initiative that saves lives and protects people should be strongly supported.

While many farmers may disagree with some recent interpretations of the Health and Safety Act, like the carrying of quad pillion passengers and heavy fines for not wearing helmets, it is clear the ‘carrot’-only approach is not working. The option to implement the ‘stick’ – fines – is a necessary one.

Yes, farming can be a dangerous occupation, but farmers and their staff must take all necessary precautions and be aware of the risks involved to mitigate the risk of accidents/and or deaths on farm.

Let’s hope more farmers are becoming more aware of the health and safety issues in their workplace. As Peter Jex-Blake, Federated Farmers Gisborne/Wairoa provincial president, said at the Safer Farms launch in his regionlast week – a change in culture is needed. “It requires a change in mind-set; which will take a while, but with the right approach, we will get there.”

Work Safe Minister Michael Woodhouse is right when he says, “The number of deaths and injuries on farms won’t be reduced by the Government sending out more inspectors. Only farmers can directly influence this toll.”

Hopefully Safer Farms will help them do this by finding health and safety solutions that work.

Fed Farmers national president William Rolleston has a key job to do in maintaining the lobby’s credibility with both its membership and the wider community

FEDERATED FARMERS has undergone a major transition during the past four-five years.

Gone are the days when the Feds would fire out deliberately antagonistic statements chastising government or industry critics for some perceived action – or lack of it. The days of being a screaming skull and demanding attention are thankfully behind it.

For Federated Farmers to be credible, with its members and the wider community, it has to be credible.

Like it or not, the reality is that Feds is the only organisation that can nationally represent the farmer’s view.

National president William Rolleston and chief executive Graham Smith are fairly new in their roles, but both have a similar attitude to what the organisation should be saying and how it should say it. They are firm believers in a ‘quality not quantity’ message.

The move by the organisation’s former chief spin doctor to work for Winston Peters, late last year, has also been timely for Feds. The bombastic style of his messaging is far better suited to an outdated, antiquated, one-trick pony, political dinosaur like NZ First than a modern-day farmer lobby.

However, Fed Farmers remains an advocacy lobby for farmers and so at times it will have to be unabashedly pro-farmer and even controversial. But this approach soon loses impact and effect when it is the lobby’s only modus operandi.

A key challenge for the farmer lobby is how to the repair the reputation of the agricultural sector with the general populace. Too often farmers are portrayed in the mainstream media as moaners, environmental vandals, money hungry bludgers, uneducated oafs and/or any combination of these descriptors.

These kinds of narratives have gone unchallenged for too long – meaning the relationship and understanding between town and country is no longer a small gap but a yawning divide.

Federated Farmers has an important role in helping close this divide. It has a far better chance of winning the hearts and minds of detractors when it is acting with credibility and facts.

It is a big job and will take a huge effort, but the work needs to start now!

She’s dry, but farmers will get through this challenge

A new year and a new set of – as well as many old – challenges face New Zealand’s agricultural sector.

Already with 2015 only just begun; we see Canterbury and other eastern parts of the country facing a long, dry summer. Meantime, Fonterra is struggling to meet its forecast payout of $4.70/kgMS and the red meat sector – especially sheep – is merely treading water.

As Waikato University’s Jacqueline Rowarth so eloquently puts it water is the burning issue for New Zealand.

While so-called environmentalists and other interest groups want stymie almost every proposed irrigation scheme mooted around the country. Take the on-going battle the proponents of the Ruataniwha dam in the Hawkes Bay continue to face in trying to get that scheme up and running.

It is easy to forget that the actual issue in New Zealand is not water – but water storage.

Again; as Professor Rowarth rightly points : ‘New Zealand receives 608 billion cubic metres of water annually, but uses only 1.8%. Just over half of that 1.8% is used in irrigation, 23% by industry, 17% in drinking water and 7% is used by stock. It is the 597 billion cubic metres of water that is currently running out to sea that is of concern’.

The challenge for the agri-sector – and those of us reliant on it – is to ensure that facts like these are seen and heard by the general population. Too often all the general public are served up with is the emotive agenda pushed by groups like Forest& Bird and/or Fish&Game – -where often the facts are not allowed to get in the way of their arguments.

There is little doubt dairy farmers will have a much tougher season this coming year than the past few. Yet, going by some of the ill-informed media reports thus far, one could be forgiven for thinking the entire dairy industry is on the brink of collapse and the country’s economy not far behind it.

History shows that all commodity sectors endure both highs and lows. Unfortunately, dairy is currently experiencing the latter – after a couple of stellar seasons of the former.

Meanwhile, to misquote Mark Twain: ‘Reports of sheep meat prices and the sector rising from the dead have been greatly exaggerated’. Sure there has been a lift in prices, but this was off an unsustainably low base and some sort of reform/rationalisation for the sector is badly needed.

I look forward to, again, sharing this journey with you.

Fonterra did not have the best of weeks with another drop in payout and highly critical WPC report

WITHOUT DOUBT last week was a bad one for Fonterra and its shareholders.

The cooperative, New Zealand’s largest company, was savaged by an independent inquiry into the handling of its infamous WPC80 false botulism scare last year.

In its 103-page report, the inquiry team, led by Miriam Dean, QC, confirmed what most people knew from August 2, 2014 – Fonterra’s response to the WPC80 case was woeful at best.

Also, last week the co-op’s directors announced a 60c/kgMS drop in this season’s forecast payout to its 10,500 farmers.

Normally, what 10,500 farmers get paid for their milk is irrelevant to townies. The 60c drop means a $6 billion reduction in potential earnings from the dairy industry this season, compared to last season’s record $8.30/kgMS payout; huge implications for the national economy.

So, how did Fonterra find itself on the ropes last week?

No one can point the finger at the co-op for the millions of litres of extra milk produced by happy farmers in the US and the EU. The extra milk is suppressing global milk prices. The question Fonterra farmers will ask is why the co-op’s management and board did not see the warning signs earlier.

The season started with an opening forecast payout of $7/kgMS, announced in May this year; slashing $2.30/kgMS from the payout within six months raises serious questions about the co-op’s forecasting ability.

The co-op says farmers expected and understand the sharp drop in prices; the writing has been on the wall for some time, but did Fonterra have to take its farmers on a roller coaster milk price ride this season?

The co-op says it will trim costs and defer capital expenditure, where possible, to generate more cash for farmers. Will it now defer major investment in global milk pools – championed by chief executive Theo Spierings – and touted as being crucial to Fonterra’s future? Short term payout pain for long term milk volume gain may not be every Fonterra farmer’s cup of tea.

What is most important to Fonterra’s future as a global player is getting its food safety credentials right.

The co-op says at the time of the recall of WPC80, it did “what was right based on the evidence we had”; Fonterra could use the same excuse for explaining how it got this season’s forecast payout so wrong.

However, the WPC80 inquiry report finds its response was far from satisfactory. Many farmers would come to the same conclusion as they milk cows over the festive season and rue the $6 billion they will never see.

YOU KNOW there is something seriously wrong with the priorities in the country’s education system when we have only 100 agricultural science graduates – compared with 120 in acupuncture – in one year.

If this wasn’t so serious it would be a joke.

Ministry of Education data tell us that of the 25,000 domestic bachelor graduates in 2013, only 350 graduated in a primary sector-related discipline. Too few high-achieving school leavers take agriculture-related studies at bachelor degree level.

As a rural-economy nation, our primary sector should be the natural place for our best and brightest people. As Associate Primary Industries Minister Jo Goodhew recently said: “We need to do more to encourage and promote the sector as an attractive and fulfilling career option for our talented young people.”

The head of Massey University’s Institute of Agriculture and Environment, Professor Peter Kemp, believes rightly that careers advisors had better be told to think it out again, i.e. cease encouraging only less ‘able’ students towards the industry, and instead change the narrative to ‘only if you are bright enough is a career in agribusiness for you’.

Channelling bright, young people towards a career in the wider, primary sector is vital to our nation’s future. Currently there are 350,000 people employed in New Zealand’s primary sector, and by 2025 this number will be closer to 400,000.

To get anywhere near achieving the Government’s goal of doubling exports by 2025, the primary industry must have the right people with the right skills. Only the best and brightest will do.

Goodhew and Kemp agree the industry’s message must emphasise that ‘doing agriculture’ doesn’t mean just farming. There’s also banking, marketing, advisory, engineering and food, to name a few. Agricultural science, farm management and agribusiness are all key fields in the primary sector.

Promotion of primary sector industry has to start in our schools – the younger the better. Goodhew is 100% right when she says: “If we want to attract talented, young people into the primary sector we need to make them, and their parents, aware of the opportunities (and salaries!) available there.”

NEW ZEALAND’S farming future is not just black and white or – at least – just black and white dairy cows.

Improving red meat prices and lower dairy prices, combined with growing concerns about the environmental impacts of more and more cows, may give impetus to the resurgence of the all-important sheep and beef sectors.

There is no doubt the rural sector and the country’s wider economy have benefitted from the boom in dairy production over the last 10 or so years. The days of New Zealand living off the sheep’s back have well and truly gone; now we’re reliant on the cow’s udder.

But concerns have been expressed about our country’s growing dairy dependence – economically and environmentally.

Some commentators, somewhat facetiously have made claims that New Zealand’s ‘one-trick’ economy – due to the importance of the dairy sector – is a recipe for economic disaster. Many of these commentators now believe their claims are being vindicated with the recent drop in dairy prices. This is far too simplistic a diagnosis and ignores the fact that all markets go up and down.

More relevant, and likely to stunt continued explosion in the country’s dairy herd, is the growing worry about the environmental impacts of dairy farming.

More and more dairy cows cannot continue to be milked in New Zealand without the country reaching ‘peak cows’ at some stage. We may not be at that point yet, but growing public pressure will soon see this time come.

The dairy industry will always be an important and vital component of New Zealand’s economic story. However, as with all things in life, it is not healthy to have all our eggs in one basket.

This is why it is good to see more positive talk about the red meat sector, e.g. Professor Tony Bywater, of Lincoln University, who says “done right, sheep farms can compete with dairy”.

He made these comments at the official opening of Lincoln University’s sheep technology farm (LUSTF) earlier this month.  Sited on the 21ha former South Island Field Days site, the new unit will be used for student and farmer training, field days, demonstrations, and research.

News that both the major meat co-operatives Silver Fern Farms and Alliance Group have experienced better returns this year – although still pitiful – is also good reason for optimism.

Let’s hope these truly are signs that long-term profitability is returning to the red meat sector – that they’re not just a flash in the pan.

New Zealand needs a strong, vibrant and profitable sheep and beef sector just as it needs a strong, vibrant and profitable dairy sector.

NEW ZEALAND wool growers have again firmly rejected the idea of a levy-paid industry-good wool organisation.

In a referendum that closed on October 10 farmers declined the opportunity for a new wool commodity levy order. The previous levy was dropped in August 2009.

The new levy promoters and advocates, the Wool Levy Group, concede the fight is lost.

Chairwoman Sandra Faulkner describes the outcome as “disappointing”. She and fellow levy group supporters have a right to be disappointed: they worked hard to get the industry-good wool organisation reinstated. But they should not be disappointed about the voter turnout.

Some 47% of eligible woolgrowers voted – still pitiful – but high compared with most commodity levy referendums that struggle to get more than a 35% turnout.

Now however, the higher-than-normal voter turnout signals that the rejection of the wool levy should be finally accepted.

The vote: 57% of farmers rejected the levy, only 43% favoured it. Meanwhile, the weighted vote from larger enterprises was even more strongly against the proposal: almost 60% rejected the levy.

Faulkner says the promoters faced a twin challenge: to ensure wool growers understood the proposal to introduce a levy under the Commodities Levy Act, and to get a strong voter turnout.

This poll result shows that both of these objectives have been met.

While some proponents of an industry-good wool organisation will be disappointed that their fellow woolgrowers have elected to reject a levy, they must now accept this is the will of a sizeable majority of growers.

Thankfully, Faulkner has conceded there is no chance of a repeat effort to force another vote.

“Growers have had their say and that’s where we are at,” she says.

It is now time to move on for the sake of all involved in the country’s $700 million wool industry.

Landcorp chief executive Steven Carden

LANDCORP CHIEF executive Steven Carden is right on the money in pointing out that the farming sector has effectively lost the confidence of the public. The ‘man in the street’ is now more inclined to believe ‘dirty dairying’ slander than the more balanced messages from NZ’s farmer lobby groups. He is also right in saying the ag sector is ineffective in telling its good news, making it unevenly matched against the few shoddy farmers who give ‘catch and kill’ – aka Fish & Game – the ammunition to create the ‘dirty dairying’ messaging. What Fish & Game, the Greens and other environmental groups – obsessed with their negative perceptions of farming – have done is insidious. They have painted a picture showing farming as a dirty, harmful activity and by implication not a good career choice. Thus it gets even harder to encourage young people to make a career in farming and the wider agribusiness sector. Plenty is going on nationwide to promote agriculture to youngsters as a career of first choice. Sadly, city folk see little of this in the mainstream media. Carden is right: farming needs to smarten up its image fast. At the same time, the perpetual knockers of farming need to reflect on the consequences of their short-sighted self-interest campaigns seemingly designed to drive up membership. The future of agriculture is too important to NZ to be manipulated by lopsided lobby groups for their own petty political interests. Is it asking too much that farmers clean up their act and that environmentalists stop whingeing every time they see a cow? Kiwi common sense must prevail where farming is shabby, then generosity might be expected from the knockers.