Word of the day

Pāhekoheko – to combine, co-operate, join, join together, unite, interact, associate, integrate, mix; combining, co-operative, joint, united, interactive, associated, integrated, mixed; connection, relationship, association, interaction, combination.

From the Maori Dictionary for  te wiki o te reo Māori/ Maori Language Week

Sowell says

Intellectuals may like to think of themselves as people who “speak truth to power” but too often they are people who speak lies to gain power.

— Thomas Sowell Quotes (@ThomasSowell) September 7, 2019

Rural round-up

Accord improves water quality – Hugh Stringleman:

The country’s dairy farmers have made significant achievements in water quality over five years of the Sustainable Dairying: Water Accord, DairyNZ says.

Over 98% of eligible waterways have been fenced to exclude cattle, a total of more than 24,000km of measured waterways.

Almost all, 99.8%, of 36,000 regular livestock crossing points on dairy farms now have bridges or culverts.

Some 94% of the Accord’s 11,079 dairy farms, or 10,396 farms, had nutrient budgets in the 2017-18 season and just over half of farms with waterways have riparian management plans. . . 

MVM seeks investors as cashflow issues draw near– Brent Melville:

Infant formula producer Mataura Valley Milk (MVM) can pay its bills for about another month.

The Chinese-owned infant formula producer, which moved into production scarcely a year ago and recently began work on a $5million expansion to its McNab plant near Gore, needs an additional $12million in funding to cover expected production and operational costs for the next nine months.

At its current rate of expenditure, the company directors say it will exhaust its existing bank facilities during September.

In an assurance to company directors, creditors and staff, MVM’s financial statements for its first full reporting period to end December 2018, note that it has a letter of financial support from main shareholder China Animal Husbandry Group (CAHG), valid for a period of 13 months from May 27, 2019. . . 

Camouflage level = expert #calving19 pic.twitter.com/tXOSpGjewS

— Anieka Templer (@AniekaNick) September 7, 2019

Seoul restaurant orders NZ goat– Yvonne O’Hara:

Central Otago goat meat will be on the menu at a new New Zealand-themed restaurant in Seoul, South Korea, next month, and more chevon suppliers are needed to meet expected future demand if franchise plans take off.

The yet to be named restaurant, is part of the Shilla Hotel business, and will be open at the end of October, with the launch to be televised.

In addition to New Zealand goat meat, it will offer beef and lamb as well as wine, initially from Shaky Bridge and Clyde Village vineyards.

New Zealand Premium Goat Meat Ltd, which was recently launched by John Cockcroft, of Clyde, and Dougal Laidlaw, of Alexandra, has been contracted to supply the new restaurant with goat meat. . . 

Forest and Bird calls for Government funding to eradicate wallaby ‘plague’ – Giles Dexter:

It turns out possums aren’t the only Australian invaders posing a major threat to New Zealand’s ecosystem.

The wallaby population is reaching plague levels in some regions, and if nothing is done, the marsupials could cost the country $84 million a year in economic losses.

“In Australia, they’re native. There, it’s a completely different thing. They’re supposed to be there, they’re not supposed to be in New Zealand,” says Forest and Bird’s central North Island regional manager Dr Rebecca Stirnemann. . . 

New owners but training role remains –

In a win-win for the Rangitikei farming community and farm-based training, Otiwhiti Station is staying in local hands.

The property was put on the market in June and there were fears its sale could lead to the closure of its training school, which has been operating since 2007.

But it is business as usual for the 1679ha station near Hunterville after a group of local farmers and business people got together and bought the property for an undisclosed price.

The group’s was one of four tenders received for the property. . . 

Experienced amazing Argentine hospitality at the Born family’s Caldines annual cattle sale on day 6 of the #RaboGrainsTour @RabobankAU pic.twitter.com/Z4PRDQO5Gx

— Will Banks (@WillBanks5) September 6, 2019

Northland school’s lambe creche a great learning opportunity – Susan Botting:

Maungatapere School families are getting lambs from as far away as South Auckland for this year’s Ag Day due to a national shortage.

Lambs are typically sourced locally but this year are coming from as far afield as South Auckland, more than 185km away.

Increased demand for lambs because of cattle disease Mycoplasma bovis, fewer lambs produced than in previous years and later-than-usual lambing are among reasons for the shortage. . . 

 

Cancer survival rates

What has made the difference to cancer survival rates?

Research.

That is what is needed to find better treatments and cures.

Early detection is also important.

 

Hat Tip: Utopia

F is for

Is anyone surprised so much of the fee-free money was wasted?

A third of tertiary students who took up the Government’s flagship fees-free policy failed or withdrew from at least one of their courses last year, Ministry of Education data shows.

The Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) did not have details on how much the Government had spent on courses students failed or withdrew from.

But based on the 13,770 students who failed to complete at least one course, and the average course cost of $2800 for Student Achievement Component, the figure could be as high as $40 million.

Further information from the TEC showed that fees-free students tended to be younger, more likely to be NZ European, and more engaged in university-level study than non-fees-free students. . . 

The drop-out rate is similar to past years which shows the policy was flawed from the start.

Previous data releases show it hasn’t encouraged more people into tertiary study and most of the people getting their fees paid would have studied anyway.

The fee-free policy was a misguided election-bribe.

The number of children not ready to learn when they start school, the number failing at school and the number leaving functionally illiterate and innumerate should have been the targets for education funding.

Any assistance for tertiary education should have been carefully targeted where it would make a positive difference to students in need of help, to improve tuition standards, or to enhance the incentives for graduates to work in jobs and areas which find it difficult to attract staff.

F is for fees-free. It’s also for failed, flawed and flopped and for this policy it ought to be for finished.

Quote of the day

The greater the state, the more wrong and cruel its patriotism, and the greater is the sum of suffering upon which its power is founded. Leo Tolstoy who was born on this day in 1828.

September 9 in history

9 –  Arminius’ alliance of six Germanic tribes ambushed and annihilated three Roman legions of Publius Quinctilius Varus in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest.

1000 Battle of Svolder.

1379  Treaty of Neuberg, split Austrian Habsburg lands between the Habsburg Dukes Albert III and Leopold III.

1493 Battle of Krbava field, a decisive defeat of Croats in the fight against the invasion by the Ottoman Empire.

1513  James IV of Scotland was defeated and died in the Battle of Flodden Field, ending Scotland’s involvement in the War of the League of Cambrai.

1543 Mary Stuart, at nine months old, was crowned “Queen of Scots”.

1585  – Cardinal Richelieu, French cardinal and politician, was born (d. 1642).

1739 Stono Rebellion, the largest slave uprising in Britain’s mainland North American colonies prior to the American Revolution, started.

1754 William Bligh, British naval officer, was born (d. 1817).

1776 The Continental Congress officially named its new union of sovereign states the United States.

1791  Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, was named after President George Washington.

1828 Leo Tolstoy, Russian novelist, was born (d. 1910).

1839 John Herschel took the first glass plate photograph.

1850 – The Compromise of 1850 stripped Texas of a third of its claimed territory in return for the U.S. federal government assuming $10 million of Texas’s pre-annexation debt.

1868  – Mary Hunter Austin, American author, poet, and critic, was born (d. 1934).

1885 – Miriam Licette, English soprano and educator (d. 1969), was born.

1886 The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works was finalised.

1890 – Colonel Sanders, American businessman, founded KFC, was born(d. 1980).

1911 – John Gorton, Australian lieutenant and politician, 19th Prime Minister of Australia, was born (d. 2002).

1914  World War I: The creation of the Canadian Automobile Machine Gun Brigade, the first fully mechanized unit in the British Army.

1922 Greco-Turkish War of 1919-1922 ended with Turkish victory over the Greeks.

1922 Hoyt Curtin, American songwriter, was born (d. 2000).

1923  Mustafa Kemal Atatürk founded the Republican People’s Party.

1924 Hanapepe Massacre on Kauai, Hawaii.

1926 – The U.S. National Broadcasting Company was formed.

1940 George Stibitz pioneered the first remote operation of a computer.

1941 Otis Redding, American singer and songwriter, was born (d. 1967).

1942  World War II: A Japanese floatplane dropped incendiary bombs on Oregon.

1944  World War II: The Fatherland Front took power in Bulgaria through a military coup in the capital and armed rebellion in the country establishing anew pro-Soviet government.

1945  Second Sino-Japanese War: Japan formally surrendered to China.

1945 First  case of a computer bug being found: a moth lodged in a relay of a Harvard Mark II computer at Harvard University.

1948 Republic Day of Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

1951 Alexander Downer, Australian politician, was born.

1952 David A. Stewart, English musician (Eurythmics), was born.

1956 Elvis Presley appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time.

1960 Hugh Grant, English actor, was born.

1965 – Hurricane Betsy made its second landfall near New Orleans, Louisiana, leaving 76 dead and $1.42 billion ($10–12 billion in 2005 dollars) in damages.

1966 Adam Sandler, American actor and comedian, was born.

1969  Rachel Hunter, New Zealand model and actress, was born.

1969  Allegheny Airlines Flight 853 DC-9 collided in flight with a Piper PA-28 and crashed near Fairland, Indiana.

1971  The four-day Attica Prison riot began.

1974 – Gok Wan, English fashion stylist, author, and television host, was born.

1976 The Wanganui Computer Act established the New Zealand government’s first centralised electronic database.

1990  1990 Batticaloa massacre, massacre of 184 minority Tamil civilians by Sri Lankan Army.

1991 Tajikstan gains independence from the Soviet Union.

1993  The Palestine Liberation Organization officially recognised Israel as a legitimate state.

2000 Victoria Federica de Marichalar y de Borbón, granddaughter of king Juan Carlos I of Spain, was born.

2001 Ahmed Shah Massoud, leader of the Northern Alliance, was assassinated in Afghanistan.

2001 – Pärnu methanol tragedy  in Pärnu County,  Estonia.

2004  –  2004 Australian embassy bombing in Jakarta killed 10 people.

2009 – Vladikavkaz bombing:  a suicide car bomber detonated his explosives at the Central market in Vladikavkaz killing at least 17 and injuring more than 160.

2009 – The Dubai Metro, the first urban train network in the Arabian Peninsula, was ceremonially inaugurated.

2010 – A natural gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, California, created a “wall of fire” more than 1,000 feet (300 m) high.

2012 – The Indian space agency put into orbit its heaviest foreign satellite yet, in a streak of 21 consecutive successful PLSV launches.

2012 – A wave of attacks killed more than 108 people and injure 351 others in Iraq.

2015 – Elizabeth II became the longest reigning monarch of the United Kingdom.

2016 – Fifth nuclear weapon testing by North Korea was completed.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia