Word of the day

Dauncy – poorly; unwell.

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Rural round-up

Solid result for Fonterra:

Fonterra farmers will receive a final milk payout of $6.52/kgMS for last season.

The 2016-17 payout, for season ending May 31, includes a milk price of $6.12/kgMS and a dividend of 40 cents per share.

The co-op announced the final payout as part of its 2017 annual results.

Revenue increased by 12% to $19.2 billion, with rising prices offsetting a 3% decline in volumes at 22.9 billion liquid milk equivalent (LME). Normalised EBIT of $1.2 billion was down 15% as a result of reduced margins across the business which also influenced net profit after tax, down 11% at $745 million. . .

Cattle disease tests now reach 20,000 :

The Ministry for Primary Industries has now completed more than 20,000 tests for the cattle disease Mycoplasma bovis.

The disease, which causes illness in cattle including mastitis, abortion, pneumonia, and arthritis, was first detected in New Zealand in a South Canterbury farm on July 21.The bacterium is an unwanted organism under the Biosecurity Act 1993. . . 

Lamb numbers tipped to be higher this season –

Lamb numbers are expected to be between 5-10 per cent higher this season than last, Silver Fern Farms says.

This equates to about 20 million lambs, the meat processor said, and could be good news for farmers because demand from China and the United States is strong.

Cattle numbers are tipped to be similar or slightly up, with some of the retentions out of the dairy herd last year expected to boost bull and even heifer numbers.

“We expect lamb numbers to be up this coming season. All the feedback we are receiving is that the North Island in particular has seen good lambing,” chief executive Dean Hamilton said in a market forecast. . .

Fonterra names new CFO – Jonathan Underhill:

Fonterra Co-operative Group named Marc Rivers as chief financial officer, a position he currently holds at Roche Pharmaceuticals in Switzerland, and said he will take up the job on March 1 next year.

Mr Rivers will take up the CFO position left vacant when Lukas Paravicini was transferred to the position of chief operating officer, global consumer and food service in June. Mr Paravicini took over from Jacqueline Chow. . .

Farming is not just a job, it’s a lifestyle – Lyn Webster:

Some New Zealanders choose a business and lifestyle which takes them away from the cities.

Living rurally is often very isolated. Farmers harness water, which is abundant and otherwise runs out to sea, and turn this resource into crops, or pasture which is then used to feed animals for meat or milk.

This is an expensive and risky investment not for the faint hearted. Some days your survival depends on uncontrollable and fickle factors – weather, exchange rates, commodity prices and government policy.

Often success in farming has taken generations to achieve and many never make it. Farms are often passed down from father to son with the next generation willingly (or unwillingly in some cases) taking on the reins for the family farm. . .

America’s love affair – Jane Vesty:

New York PR director, New Zealander Jane Vesty, says our wines can ride the ‘premiumization’ trend

It’s hard to imagine a better confluence of trends for New Zealand wine in the U.S. – now the world’s largest wine market with annual sales of US$60 billion.

New Zealand wines have become the third highest imported wine into the U.S. by value at a time when American wine drinkers, especially millennial women, are trending toward premium wines that are also lighter and more elegant and sophisticated. These are perfect conditions for the Sauvignon Blanc juggernaut that accounts for 94% of our U.S. sales. . .

Is this really what NZ wanted?

Preliminary election results give no certainty as to which party will lead the next government.

Prime Minister Bill English led National to 46% support, an astounding result for a party seeking a fourth term in office.

But that 46% is only 50 seats which is not enough for a majority government.

Labour’s 35.8% was far more than its supporters could have hoped for before its leadership change but even further away from a majority. It would need both New Zealand First and the Green Party.

This means that Winston Peters, and it is the leader not his party who counts, has almost all the say on what happens next.

NZ First got only 7.5% of the vote. Polls before the election showed that its supporters were fairly evening divided on whether Peters should choose National or Labour should it be in the position to do so.

A criticism of First Past the Post was that voters in marginal seats had too much power.

But MMP has given more power to fewer people by allowing a minor party to choose the government and half of  its supporters will be disappointed regardless of whichever it is.

Is this really what New Zealand wanted?

Quote of the day

 We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. – T.S. Eliot who’s as born on this day in 1888.

September 26 in history

46 BC  Julius Caesar dedicated a temple to his mythical ancestor Venus Genetrix in accordance with a vow he made at the battle of Pharsalus.

715  Ragenfrid defeated Theudoald at the Battle of Compiègne.

1212  Golden Bull of Sicily was certified as an hereditary royal title in Bohemia for the Přemyslid dynasty.

1580  Sir Francis Drake completed his circumnavigation of the world.

1687  The Parthenon in Athens was partially destroyed by an explosion caused by the bombing from Venetian forces led by Morosini.

168  – The city council of Amsterdam voted to support William of Orange‘s invasion of England.

1783  The first battle of Shays’ Rebellion began.

1810  A new Act of Succession was adopted by the Riksdag of the Estates and Jean Baptiste Bernadotte becomes heir to the Swedish throne.

1820  Colonel Robert Gibbon Johnson proved tomatoes weren’t poisonous by eating several on the steps of the courthouse in Salem, New Jersey.

1865 The Natives Rights Act declared Maori British citizens.

1872  The first Shriners Temple (called Mecca) was established in New York City.

1888  US poet & playwright T.S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot was born (d. 1965).

1898 Composer George Gershwin was born (d. 1937).

1907 Prime Minister Sir Joseph Ward proclaimed New Zealand a dominion. Parliament Buildings were lit up in celebration.

1907  Newfoundland  became a dominion within the British Empire.

1907 English art historian & Soviet spy Anthony Blunt was born (d. 1983).

1918  World War I: The Meuse-Argonne Offensive, the bloodiest single battle in American history, began.

1932 Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was born.

1934  Steamship RMS Queen Mary was launched.

1936 South African activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela was born.

1943 – Ian Chappell, Australian cricketer and broadcaster, was born.

1945 English singer Bryan Ferry was born.

1947 US country singer Lynn Anderson was born.

1948 English-born Australian singer Olivia Newton John was born.

1949 US novelist Jane Smiley was born.

1949 English crime writer Minette Walters was born.

1950  United Nations troops recaptured Seoul from the North Koreans.

1954  Japanese rail ferry Toya Maru sank during a typhoon in the Tsugaru Strait, killing 1,172.

1960 The first televised debate took place between presidential candidates Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy.

1962  The Yemen Arab Republic was proclaimed.

1964 English singer Nicki French was born.

1970  The Laguna Fire started in San Diego County, burning 175,425 acres (710 km²).

1973  Concorde made its first non-stop crossing of the Atlantic in record-breaking time.

1981 US tennis player Serena Williams was born.

1983  Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averted a likely worldwide nuclear war by correctly identifying a report of an incoming nuclear missile as a computer error and not an American first strike.

1997  A Garuda Indonesia Airbus A-300 crashed near Medan, Indonesia, airport, killing 234.

1997  An earthquake struck  Umbria and the Marche, causing part of theBasilica of St. Francis at Assisi to collapse.

2000  Anti-globalization protests in Prague (some 20,000 protesters) turned violent during the IMF and World Bank summits.

2000  The MS Express Samina sank off Paros in the Agean sea killing 80 passengers.

2002  The overcrowded Senegalese ferry MV Joola capsised off the coast of Gambia killing more than 1,000.

2008  Swiss pilot and inventor Yves Rossy became the  first person to fly ajet engine-powered wing across the English Channel.

2009 Typhoon Ketsana (2009) hit the Philippines, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, causing 700 fatalities.

2009  – Scottish aid worker Linda Norgrove and three Afghan colleagues were kidnapped by members of the Taliban in the Kunar Province of eastern Afghanistan.

2014 – Ayotzinapa mass kidnapping in Mexico.

Sourced from NZ History Online and Wikipedia

Word of the day

Shangle – to fasten a tin or kettle to a dog¹s tail.

From here (which defines shangle but doesn’t explain why one would want to).

Rural round-up

Demonstration dairy farm cuts nitrate leaching 30% and stays profitable – Tony Benny:

Lincoln University Dairy Farm is close to achieving a 30 per cent reduction in nitrate leaching, while maintaining its profitability. The farm’s managers tell Tony Benny how it was done.

​Like other farms in the Selwyn Waihora zone, one of 10 catchment zones under Environment Canterbury’s water management strategy, Lincoln University’s dairy farm faces new environmental limits, including reducing nitrate leaching 30 per cent by 2022.

By adopting the findings of small-scale research on a nearby farmlet, the farm has all but achieved that well before the deadline and is at the same time nearly matching the financial performance of high-profit farms against which it is benchmarked. . .

Alliance buyout targets Asia – Alan Williams:

Buying its southeast Asian marketing agent is part of a 10 to 15-year strategy to increase sales and the range of meat cuts into the region, Alliance chairman Murray Taggart says.

Goldkiwi Asia has represented the southern farmer-co-operative for more than 25 years, helping to build up customer bases in China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and in Singapore where it is based.

The arrangement had worked very well but there was “no substitute for ownership and control” of the business, Taggart said. . .

Price direction depends on weather – Hugh Stringleman:

Dairy prices remained steady in the latest Global Dairy Auction, adding to speculation that continued wet weather in New Zealand might give the market a lift.

Already it was possible that NZ seasonal supply might increase 1.5% rather than the 3% predicted earlier.

The direction of international market prices would depend very much on weather conditions over the next month in NZ, the world’s largest dairy products exporter. . .

Australia threatens to cash in on NZ’s mānuka honey marketing heroics – Gerard Hutching:

First they claimed the pavlova and Phar Lap as their own, now Australians are arguing they have the right to use the Māori word mānuka for the expensive honey.

This week they racheted the dispute up a notch by setting up the Australian Manuka Honey Association.

“We’re the only two countries that produce it and the whole world needs it [mānuka honey]. We can’t understand what our Kiwi friends are trying to do,” Australian Honey Bee Industry Council chairman Lindsay Bourke said. . . .

Finalists say now is the right time to enter the Ballance Farm Environment Awards:

Don’t wait until you think you have the perfect farm to enter the Ballance Farm Environment Awards, say 2017 Southland finalists Derek and Bronnie Chamberlain.

“It’s all about work in progress. Set yourselves some goals and go for it. There’s always something more you can do,” Bronnie says.

“The more eyes you have on your property, the more advice and suggestions the better.”  . . 

Mixed New Season Outlook:

 Silver Fern Farms Chief Executive says the new season, which starts on 1 October, is expected to be mixed across beef, lamb and venison.

“On beef, we are at an interesting point. Store stock markets appear over-heated given where we expect volumes and schedules to end up. Current finished cattle schedules reflect a shortage of supply, which is typical at this time of the year.  . .