Word of the day

Thraiveless – careless; silly; restless; awkward; disinclined to do anything.

Sowell says

There was a time when we honored those who created the prosperity and the freedom that we enjoy. Today we honor the complainers and sue the creators. Perhaps that is inevitable in an era when we no longer count our blessings, but instead count all our unfulfilled wishes.

— Thomas Sowell (@ThomasSowell) April 26, 2022

Rural round-up

O’Connor now will support law changes needed for Fonterra’s capital restructuring – Point of Order:

Agriculture  Minister  Damien  O’Connor has  overcome  his objections to  the  capital restructuring of  dairy giant Fonterra  and  says  the  government  will  now  amend the Dairy Industry Restructuring Act.

The dairy giant wants to make it easier to join the company, while maintaining farmer ownership amid falling milk supply.

O’Connor  recognises  Fonterra as a key part of New Zealand’s world-leading dairy industry and a major export earner for the economy, sending product to over 130 countries.

Around 95% of all dairy milk produced in New Zealand is exported, with export revenues of  $19.1bn a year. It accounts for 35% of NZ’s total merchandise exports and around 3.1%  of GDP. The industry employs around 49,000 people. . . 

Is this the technology to win Kiwis over to genetic engineering? – Nikki Macdonald:

You’ve heard of fermenting yeast to make beer, but what about brewing GM microbes to make bioplastic? Using designer microbes to make stuff in fermentation vats has been described as the next manufacturing revolution, with potential to produce everything from cow-free cheese to sustainable fossil fuel replacements. But is GE-free New Zealand ready for it?

Veronica Stevenson bet her house deposit on a bee.

Before using GM microbes to make stuff was all the talk (Impossible Burger, mRNA vaccines), Stevenson set out to find the genetic recipe for the plastic-like film that lines the nest of a solitary Aussie bee.

All she had to do was work out which bit of the bee’s DNA linked to the nest material and put that code into a micro-organism, which then makes it in a fermentation vat, or bioreactor. . . 

Not gunna complain grass will be growing 👊 @WeatherWatchNZ @BenDooley8 pic.twitter.com/9BLm08aPYO

— Sarah Dooley (@cobb808) April 29, 2022

Country Calendar couple put hopes in hemp – Kerry Harvey:

Southland farmers Blair and Jody Drysdale don’t let fear hold them back when it comes to finding ways to make their family farm work.

“You can’t be scared of failing. Give it a go and, as long as you learn by your failures, get up and carry on again,” Blair says.

The couple are the third generation of the family to farm the 320-hectare mixed cropping and livestock farm. Jody and Blair and their three children – Carly, 13, Fletcher, 11, and Leah, nine – took over from Blair’s parents in 2008. . . 

Waikato diary farmers struggling with historic dry conditions –

Waikato dairy farmers are struggling with the region’s dry conditions, with no decent rainfall expected to fall anytime soon.

NIWA’s latest hot spot watch shows things have got really dry in the region within the last couple of weeks.

The driest soils across the North Island, compared to normal for this time of the year, are in Northern Waikato – and it doesn’t look like the situation will improve anytime soon, with no decent rain forecast.

Bart Van De ven is a sharemilker in Springdale, near Morrinsville. . . 

Where did we get the idea veganism can solve climate change? – Anthony Signorelli:

Cattle have been denigrated as a major cause of greenhouse gases (GHG) and, therefore, a cause of climate change. When I first heard this as a former farmer, I thought: That’s preposterous! Do cows have more impact than fossil fuels? No way.

Big claims

So, I looked it up. Sure enough, a 2009 report from the WorldWatch Institute claims livestock accounts for 51% of GHG — more than industry, coal-burning electricity generation, and transportation combined. Whatever those guys smoke at WorldWatch, I’d like some for Friday night! That report is no longer available on the WorldWatch site. (Links go to a dead page. A reader sent me this one.) It’s not hard to figure out why.

The original story emphasizing the GHG contribution of livestock came from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). FAO published a study authored by Henning Steinfeld in 2006, which claimed that livestock produced 18% of global GHG and concluded that livestock was producing more GHG than the entire transportation sector. Although it is a mystery how WorldWatch inflated that to 51% three years later, the claim in the FAO study was eye-catching. Apparently, many eyes caught it, and then they read WorldWatch, too.

But there was a slight problem. . . 

Good morning all pic.twitter.com/BEhefjprQB

— ᖇOᗪ ᗰᑌᒪᒪIᑎ 🌱🐄🥛🥩 (@RodMullin) May 1, 2022

Ravensdown secures co-funding to eliminate coal from aglime process :

Ravensdown announces today that it has achieved government co-funding to accompany the co-operative’s investment to install a biomass combustor at its Dipton lime quarry. Locally supplied wood fuel will replace coal in the lime-drying process – an important part of preparing the naturally occurring soil conditioner for use by Southland farmers and growers.

The co-operative’s commitment is being matched by funding through the Government Investment in Decarbonising Industry (GIDI) Fund. The funding agreement with EECA (Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority) commits Ravensdown to savings of at least 1,107 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per annum, reducing Ravensdown’s direct carbon footprint by almost 10%.

According to EECA, process heat accounts for over a quarter of New Zealand’s energy-related emissions, presenting a huge opportunity for businesses to take a lead in climate change mitigation. The GIDI Fund is part of the government’s Covid Response and Recovery Fund, established to drive economic stimulus and job creation through decarbonisation projects. . . 

Winston Churchill’s wisdon

Politics are very much like war. We may even have to use poison gas at times. #Churchill #quote

— Winston Churchill (@Sir__Churchill) April 26, 2022

Late and lax again

The government is crowing about a trial of what could be a welcome addition to  the Covid-testing tool box.

New, more accurate Covid tests which return results in 30 minutes will be trialled at Auckland Airport.

Lamp (loop-mediated isothermal amplification) tests can be self-administered like a RAT (rapid antigen test), but are much more accurate.

They will be trialled at the airport, initially limited to 30 Air NZ staff, and could eventually be used in hospitals, aged care and other sectors, Associate Minister for Covid-19 Response Dr Ayesha Verrall said this morning.

“The Lucira test is shown in clinical trials to be … close to the accuracy of PCR tests, but also the convenience of being a test you can purchase and then take with you to wherever you need it,” she said at a press conference at Auckland Airport. . . 

The Lucira devices had not yet been licensed in New Zealand for broader use. But if the trial proved successful, they could one day be used by travellers.

“Potentially you could carry this test in your suitcase and … then you would know coming back into New Zealand you had the test you need,” Verrall said. 

“You wouldn’t need to run around a foreign city trying to find where you could buy a PCR test. It would be cheaper, and the airline would potentially be able to see the online verification of your test, and know your result was negative.” . . 

Faster, more accurate and able to be carried with you is good, but Sir Ian Taylor writes in a Linked in Post that Lucira could have been here much, much sooner:

OMG!!! LUCIRA. The DPMC has really gone for broke with the PR spin on the Lucira trial – if there is anyone from the media out there who would like another take on this then I am happy to chat. I’d normally write an opinion piece but right now I am focused on my day job and the staggering array of opportunities that have arisen from one, 3 day trip to the US and the NAB show in Vegas.

You won’t need to be stuck behind the DPMC’s on going strategy that make it almost impossible to get the emails you need to show that nothing they are spinning right now bears any resemblance to the truth. I have the email that was sent to the MOH in July 2020 inviting them to be one of 5 countries to be part of the trial that would reduce PCR testing from 4-5 days ( at that time) to 30 minutes. I also have their dismissive – “thanks but no thanks” reply. Happy to share.

Then there are the emails shared with Grant Robertson and Ayesha Verrall back in December of last year with information on Lucira and introducing them to the team at Lucira Health that I had been working with (with no help from the govt) to organise 20,000 doses to be sent immediately to New Zealand for a trial that could have been conducted by Terry Taylor (President of NZIMLS) in less than a week. This shipment was supported by the confidential results of intensive trials conducted by Lucira clients like Canada, Israel, and Qatar. We could have had this trial done and dusted by mid-January – if everyone in the govt hadn’t gone on the PM’s famous “well-earned break!! Then there was the interesting meeting called to discuss the plan to use Lucira – and other kiwi tech – to get kiwis home that I had prepared with the “Cross Sector Border Group” where I was told that only the govt and Air New Zealand were authorised to speak about Lucira in the future ( I introduced Greg Foran to Lucira as well) and I was asked to stop writing those “bad faith articles” about the govt.

While they have dilly dallied – we got 2,000 of the Lucira tests to Tonga at no cost and organised 65 million Orient Gene RATs to be delivered here at a time when the govt was so far behind the 8 ball they were requisitioning ours. . . .

Who do you believe – the government’s PR machine on the businessman who gets things done?

Contrary to the lines it repeats, the government’s response to Covid-19 wasn’t hard and early at the start, it certainly wasn’t hard and early with the vaccination rollout and now it’s been shown to be late and lax again with a trial of Lucira.