About Homepaddock

 

 

What: news and views from a rural perspective, with a blue tint, that might also include musings on other matters which interest, entertain, amuse or irritate me.

 

 

Why: when I was a child if you didn’t live on a farm (and I didn’t) you probably had family or friends who did. That is no longer the case. New Zealanders are now predominantly city dwellers and the media reflects that so the rural voice is weaker and consequently the urban-rural divide is growing.

 

 

From: a North Otago sheep, beef and dairy farm (that’s the view from my kitchen window above).  

 

 

WHO: I am a journalist by training and a bitser in practice. I do a little freelance writing, am North Otago correspondent on Newstalk ZB’s Farming Show and a contributor to the ODT’s Paddock Talk; teach Spanish night classes (with the very necessary assistance of a Uruguayan friend porque mi español está oxidado) and am a registered marriage celebrant.

 

 I am a media junkie with a particular interest in rural issues, politics (I’m National’s Southern regional chair); health (I was deputy chair of Waitaki District Health Services) and disability issues (as a result of the lives and deaths of my sons who had degenerative brain disorders.)

 

Ele Ludemann

 

You can contact me at: ele at ludemann dot co dot nz