Wonderful wool, our ‘supermaterial’, is at a crossroads – adapt or disappear – Piers Fuller:
Once a stalwart of our economy, the wool sector faces some tough decisions to ensure its survival. Piers Fuller reports.
For those lanolin-soaked old shearers who remember the glory days of the New Zealand wool industry, the collapse of our strong wonder fibre is something of a disaster.
For many modern economists, the writing is on the wall and it is time to face reality and produce something the world wants.
Unfortunately, what the world has wanted in recent decades has been cheap, petroleum-based synthetics. . .
We are loved again – Nick Loughnan:
In our time of farming, Faith and I have known the ups and downs of affairs – not those that involve other people’s hearts. We’ve been together for 45 years. No, these affairs at their peak were about being needed and valued to the point of privilege, just because of what we do. We’re farmers.
At the start of our career, we certainly belonged to a privileged bunch. Deciding we wanted to own our own farm, but with neither of us having chosen parents who already had one, we had to start from scratch. Yet there were great incentives for us in our early 20s to get the breaks.
Governments had, for decades through different schemes, been developing extensive tracts of marginal land, subdividing these into smaller ‘economic’ units, complete with new dwellings, sheds, yards and fences, and then balloting them off. . .
Growing demand for antibiotic-free meat – Annette Scott:
A sudden surge in orders for antibiotic-free meat has processors on the hop as they struggle to meet market demand.
Alliance general manager livestock and shareholder services Danny Hailes said the co-operative is desperately seeking farmers to join its Raised Without Antibiotics (RWA) programme.
He said while global markets are generally subdued, there is growing demand for antibiotic-free meat.
“We have one customer, (in) North America, where demand is just growing as customers become increasingly conscious of what they are eating,” he said. . .
The Covid-19 lockdown has kept international hunters at home and meant a very lean season for their NZ guides, as Annabelle Latz reports.
The stags were roaring, yet not a hunter was to be seen.
Owing to Covid-19 lockdown rules there were no trophy hunters gathering from around New Zealand or abroad to enjoy the roar this year.
Instead, hunting guides were left with empty appointment books, hunters stayed home, and stags remained untouched.
John Royle of Canterbury Tahr Hunter Guide NZ has been guiding for more than 12 years and this was the first time ever he’s been ground to a halt during the roar, his most lucrative season with full appointment books. He has lost potentially three months’ business. . .
Coculture brings environmental and economic benefits –
Research scientists say law changes are required before lucrative new species, which also bring environmental benefits, can be harvested from existing marine farms.
A paper from Niwa’s Jeanie Stenton-Dozey and Jeffrey Ren, Cawthron’s Leo Zamora and independent researcher Philip Heath appears in the latest NZ Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research.
It looks at opportunities for Integrated Multitrophic Aquaculture (IMTA) – also known as coculture. You may also have heard the term polyfarming which was the title for an MFA- supported Smart+Connected Aquaculture forum in Havelock in 2017.
The forum was held to encourage pathways to new added-value products and diversify production into other high value species. . .
A true picture of our rural lifestyle – Joyce Campbell:
Keeping my big mouth shut is never easy for me, but over the past year I’ve managed not to tell too many folk that we’ve been filming with a team from the BBC for series four of This Farming Life.
It wasn’t a decision that any of us took lightly but I wanted to take the opportunity to strengthen our relationship with the consumers of the food we produce and share the stories of the rural communities we live in.
A slot on BBC2 at prime time, to a UK-wide audience, was worth me taking the time and effort to engage with the wider public.
I’m not going to lie – I was extremely nervous on Tuesday night as the opening titles rolled, but two Rock Rose gin and tonics helped to settle the gut-churning emotions. . .
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