Tankers power in
By Mary Anne Gill
Fonterra predicts fuel savings of 60 percent from six electric milk tankers the co-operative has on the road in time for the new season.
Infrastructure to support the tankers is in place at the dairy factories, including Hautapu plant in Cambridge.
Details were revealed at Fonterra’s annual meeting with neighbours last week when Environmental manager Jude van Bommel revealed the fleet decarbonisation would provide many environmental benefits.
The tankers are part of a $150 million in electrification projects across the North Island over the next 18 months. The move will take the equivalent of 6500 cars off the road. Each tanker can drive 75km on a single charge.
The e-tanker was trialled over two years at Waitoa near Morrinsville.
Other investments into electric boilers at
Whareroa, Edgecumbe and Waitoa sites mark further steps in renewable energy supporting Fonterra’s sustainability targets while future-proofing operations.
Fonterra’s chief operating officer Anna Palairet said in a release the investments are a significant step for the co-operative’s future operations.
Hautapu had the last coal boiler in the North Island and it was turned off last year. The boiler has been fully converted to biomass and is firing on wooden pellets.
“Choosing the right energy solutions is about striking a balance between affordability, security of energy supply and reducing our environmental footprint, and the new electric boilers are crucial to navigating this challenge,” said Palairet.
“These electrification projects are at the heart of ensuring efficient operations with a reliable energy supply for our manufacturing sites and to support the
long-term sustainability of our business. It also represents a commitment to our farmer owners that we are building a resilient, future-ready co-operative.”
Commissioning of Hautapu’s new $85 million wastewater treatment plant began in February with biological startup in April. The plant treats processing wastewater and other wastewater streams through a tank, segregating it into several sections where microorganisms break down organic matter and reduce a range of contaminants including nitrogen and phosphorous.
The water either goes onto Hautapu’s management farms or, when weather conditions are too wet on the farms, through a final filtration for discharge into Waikato River.
Van Bommel produced samples of the treated water which attendees at the annual meeting were able to smell but not drink.
Fonterra is waiting on final resource consent to discharge at a new point in the river from its original consent. The co-operative wants to release the treated water at the same point of the river as Waipā District Council, adjacent to the Te Awa Cycle Ride and the new St Peter’s residential development.
Hautapu is expecting its first milk to the site on July 16. Biomass will be introduced into the wastewater treatment plant’s southern bioreactor in August, the biological treatment will be fine-tuned and there will be an iwi blessing in September. The plant should be fully operational by July next year.
One of the new electric tankers on its trial at Waitoa.
Photo: Supplied.
Fonterra principal environmental engineer Tom Bamford shows a section of Fonterra’s new Hautapu wastewater plant where commissioning is about to finish. Photo: Mary Anne Gill
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Plan change review begins
The Environment Court is likely to reconvene in September to review responses to its interim decision on regional council plans to improve water quality in the Waikato and Waipā rivers.
The Waikato Regional Council has until July 25 to the 376-page decision released on Wednesday last week.
Waikato Regional Council Chief Executive Chris McLay said this was a complex plan change in development for 12 years, and time would be needed for staff to digest the interim decision and address the 35 directions of the court.
It is a change to the Waikato Regional Plan, developed with the community, to allow for the management of nitrogen, phosphorus, sediment and bacteria in the Waikato and Waipā rivers.
A decisions version of the proposed plan change that considered 1100 individual submissions, was notified in April 2020 and subsequently appealed by a number of parties. It is these appeals the Environment Court has made their interim decision on.
- and now we’re seeing steps towards more sensible national direction to local authorities.”
Hurst said it was particularly welcoming that the Government wants a more balanced approach to Te Mana o Te Wai.
“That concept, as pursued by the previous Government, has been unworkable and highly problematic.
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“The policies and rules are still not operative, but this interim decision takes the plan change one step closer. For farmers and growers, it means there’s no action required right now until a final determination by the court,” McLay said.
Proposed Waikato Regional Plan Change 1 is the first step in a planned 80-year journey to achieve rivers with improved water quality, that are safe for food gathering along their entire length and meet the requirements of Te Ture Whaimana o Te Awa o Waikato - Vision and Strategy for the Waikato River.
Meanwhile Federated Farmers has applauded the Government’s announcement of a comprehensive review of freshwater regulations.
“We’re pleased to see all options are on the table and that consultation will be open until July 27,” said Federated Farmers freshwater spokesperson Colin Hurst.
“The previous Government’s freshwater rules were completely unworkable for farmers. In some cases, even if you converted a whole catchment to native forest, you still wouldn’t have achieved the bottom lines.
“The current Government simply had to push pause on these rules
Ready, steady...
“It was unclear how councils should interpret and apply what was a vague concept of protecting the mana and mauri of water under Labour’s rules, and what that might mean for our farms and rural communities.”
Under Te Mana o te Wai, the health and wellbeing of water is put ahead of all other considerations, including human health, and social, cultural and economic wellbeing.
“That seems wildly imbalanced. The Government’s announcements today recognise such a strict hierarchy is flawed.”
The consultation document says:
“Multiple objectives require councils to provide for multiple outcomes and can better reflect the interests of all water users.”
“Federated Farmers absolutely agrees with this. In fact, we believe it’s worth considering whether Te
Mano o te Wai is a concept that should be scrapped altogether, which is one of the options now on the table,” Hurst said.
Another big question is whether it’s worth making these freshwater changes right now under the current Resource Management Act (RMA), or if this should wait until the Government has reformed the RMA, with the freshwater changes to follow.
“Federated Farmers will be reading through the detail of today’s announcement and going back to the Government with our position, on behalf of our members, in the next few weeks.”
Chris McLay
English sports fans would say “ it’s coming home...” The annual June Fieldays expo at Waipā’s Mystery Creek is just day away, and The News snapped this site shot as work to set everything up continued. Fieldays will run from June11 to 14.
Fed leader is on the move
By Chris Gardner
Waikato Federated
Farmers new president Phil Sherwood is taking the executive on the road.
Sherwood, 40, said the first executive meeting of his presidency would be held in the Waipā district coupled with an event to attract members.
“It’s part of the engagement process, taking our executive and going back to the region,” he said.
The executive has met at the Waikato Farmers Trust building in Hamilton for decades, but the building’s recent sale has prompted a rethink.
“It was a good opportunity to reevaluate where we are at.”
Sherwood, who up until last season farmed two dairy herds of 500 cows supplying Open Country on two farms near Matamata, was just a few weeks into his new role when The News caught
up with him at Farmers Trust building where he and fellow members were sorting through boxes of memorabilia.
It’s too early to say where the presidential office will move to.
This season Sherwood is overseeing a 50/50 herd owner and share milker on one of his farms, and a contract milker on the other.
Educated at Hinuera School and Matamata College, Sherwood was raised on the family farm and took up farming at 16 where, apart from a couple of short spells off farm, he has remained farming.
In Federated Farmers, he has served as dairy chair and vice president, before succeeding Keith Holmes as president.
Profitability is a key word frequently mentioned at Waikato Federated Farmers executive meetings.
“We need to be profitable, from not just a farming
perspective but from a Waikato perspective. We need those industry groups like Beef and Lamb, Dairy NZ and the Foundation for Arable Research to be really championing that profit,” he said. “Profit will drive innovation.”
And he is waiting expectantly for the outcome of the government’s Finance and Expenditure Committee’s inquiry into banking competition.
“Banks have got their foot on the throats of some farmers,” he said.
“We feed into that rural economy, and I would like to think that they would take their foot of the throat of a few farmers trying to do the right thing.”
When it comes to rural advocacy, the issue at the top of Sherwood’s list is the upcoming Waikato River catchment wide implementation of farm environment plans as part of Waikato Regional Council’s
Plan Change One.
“It’s not going away,” he said. “It’s still there.”
The Environment Court released a 376-page interim decision on May 28, giving the regional council until July 25 to propose amendments taking into account feedback from parties who appealed the plan change.
Another issue dear to Sherwood’s heart is pest control. He advocates a holistic approach between farmers, the Department of Conservation, Operational
Solutions for Primary Industries, and Waikato Regional Council to eliminate a siloed approach to the problem.
“The problem is that they all work in isolation to a common goal, and are not working collaboratively,”
Sherwood said. “I would like to see how we can collaborate.”
Sherwood believes in finding common ground with others.
“You can’t be everything to everybody, but you can find the common ground. When
you have got that you can move forward from there. Sherwood also serves on AgriZero’s farmer focus group as it created tools to rapidly reduce emissions while maintaining profitability and productivity. Sherwood said it was too early to share too much about the work of the partnership between the government and agribusiness, but he hoped it would result in breaking the disconnect between the farmer and the consumer.
Waikato Federated Farmers president Phil Sherwood is seeking a new office after the sale of the Waikato Farmers Trust building in Hamilton.
Photo: Chris Gardner.
The Waikato Farmers Trust building in Hamilton.
The drought – and the impact
By Chris Gardner
“I haven’t killed a lamb in a while,” says Te Waitere sheep and beef farmer Chris Irons as he ponders around 70 layoffs at Te Kūiti Meat Processors.
Irons and partner Debra Hastie supplies the company behind TK Natural Lamb which is cutting
its workforce by about a third in response to declining lamb processing numbers.
The couple sent 2,500 lambs to the works earlier in the drought impacted season and have just 45 to go. Some will go to the works in June and more will follow in September.
Te Kūiti Meat Processors told
workers in May that around a third of their 240 number would be laid off this month due to the declining numbers.
“It got dry earlier in the season and farmers sold their lambs out of the region store,” Irons said.
“They won’t have come back into the region.”
“We were in drought, but we
weren’t as bad as Aria and Wharepapa South,” he said.
Irons said the 2023-24 season was drier on their 770-hectare farm, and they had responded by dropping ewe numbers by 10 per cent.
“We realised that we were a bit overstocked so that was a lever we pulled,” he said.
“When it came to this year stock were in a better situation, and we got rid of a lot of lambs store so that when it did go dry in January we did not have as many, and it gave us options.”
Irons and Hastie have supplied Te Kūiti Meat Processors premium Whole Foods Market programme for years, fetching $184 per 20kg lamb in recent times.
“Every quarter we put forward our needs and they grant us that space,” Irons said.
“They are very good to work with as a company.”
Irons felt sad that meat workers were losing their jobs, but said the downsize would ensure the business could continue to operate and serve farmers.
“What else are they supposed to do?”
Supplying Amazon-owned Whole Foods Market which supplies groceries to A listers in the US has served the couple well. The store offers a wide range of products, including fresh produce, meats, dairy, and pantry staples, all free from artificial preservatives,
colours, and hydrogenated fats.
“We would love it if someone sent us an email saying thank you very much,” he said.
The couple also supply the Angus Special Reserve grass fed and antibiotic free programme through Auckland based Wilson Hellaby meat processing company and Greenlea Premier Meats in Hamilton.
Irons is not one to complain, but he would love wool buyers to specify their needs with farmers.
“As farmers we are not getting messages back from the industry about what is the ideal length,” he said. “We could manage it a lot more if we got told what they wanted. Should we shear every six months, or should we go to eight months?”
Irons grew up in Te Kūiti and worked in parents’ Ray and Sue trucking company Irons Transport after school and in the holidays “After high school I really wanted to go farming,” he said.
After school he completed a oneyear Diploma in Agriculture at Massey University.
“I had 38 hours of lectures per week,” he said. “It was ideal, it meant I was studying and learning about what to do on farm.”
After a short stint in Australia truck driving, he landed a shepherding job which lasted six years before he was promoted to farm manager.
“A few people said I wouldn’t be able to handle it, but that was an
Te Waitere sheep and beef farmers Chris Irons and Debra Hastie.
Photo: Chris Gardner
incentive,” he said.
“It was a good challenge.”
After seven years, in 2011, Irons and Hastie accepted an offer to join his parents in a farm partnership at Te Waitere.
“It needed a lot of work,”
After five years the couple bought Iron’s parents out and expanded the farm.
Their son Ethan, 19, works for OPS Plumbing and Pipeline in Bell Block, while daughter Sophie, 17, is studying at nearby New Plymouth Girls’ High School.
Today they have help from a Growing Future Farmers agricultural training programme student.
“There’s lots of people wishing to get into farming,” he said.
“Sheep and beef farming is reasonably comfortable. A little bit more positive than it has been in the last couple of years. There’s been a 25 per cent increase in prices in the last year.”
The increase is not just driven by a drop in supply due to New Zealand droughts, but similar conditions in Australia, South America, and the United States.
Irons is a firm believer in building community, working as chair of the Waitomo branch of Federated Farmers and representing farmers with Operational Solutions for Primary Industries (OSPRI).
He’s a regular at Te Waitere Boating Club shin digs. “They’ve got a real community feel.”
He’s continued on the Kinohaka School board of trustees, despite having no children at the school, and is a member of New Plymouth Girls’ High School Scotland House Sub Committee.
Chris Irons
Photo: Chris Gardner
Peter Nation - led by example
By Roy Pilott
On the day the news became public, Peter Nation delighted in being able to share it with his wider family – but in particular one person who had been an inspiration to him throughout his life.
That was his dad – 95 year old Arnold Nation.
Because the dedication Peter Nation has brought to agriculture industry and governance – a contribution rewarded when he became an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit – can be traced back to a sheep and beef farm, and sawmill, in the Turakina Valley north west of Hunterville which his parents ran. It was a fourth generation operation and involved seven families – a significant employer.
Arnold, self-taught, “he didn’t turn on power until he was 21” ran the operation while filling a host of roles in the community.
The family’s influence in the community was significant.
“When someone would ring and say we are building a new fire station or a new ambulance station – the family would cut the timber for nothing.
“Mum was heavily involved in politics so we would have meetings at home and big political celebrations ... she’d be baking for the pet day.
“That’s all relevant to me today – the boy from the valley,” Nation said.
But following his father’s lead did not equate
to a career in farming or silviculture.
“Mum told me the heaviest thing I would lift would be a pen.”
So, the teenager fresh out of boarding at Wanganui Boys’ College – who had been charged with doing the staff wages at home - opted for a career in banking.
At 17, Nation – who was born on Anzac Day (April 25) 1961 – was involved in Jaycees, he worked with a group to build a squash club – and he was attending Chamber of Commerce meetings. All the while, his day job involved 40 minutes each way up the valley to get to work.
Mum, Prue, died when Nation was 18, so was not there to celebrate his rapid rise through the ANZ banking ranks. He was one of their youngest managers nine years later in Waverley. At 30 he was a career banker, he had met his wife to be Ali – now an advisory partner with PKF Hamilton - and moves to Hamilton and the Coromandel Peninsula followed. A return to Hamilton came with a new direction – rural banking.
New Zealand Fieldays was one of his customers and he oversaw the approval for credit to build the first pavilion at Mystery Creek and also looked after sponsorship for Fieldays, eventually joining their board.
The rural links continued when he left banking after 26 years - a redundancy victim of the ANZ-National banks merger - to work for Gallaghers, becoming national sales manager.
In the early 1990s he became involved – and
highly supportive – of new environmental awards which were presented at Hamilton’s Distinction Hotel. He saw some practises his father had introduced many years ago being replicated. Talks followed and it was suggested the award go national.
In 1993-94 he was instrumental in securing significant sponsorship packages for the awards. The Ballance Farm Environment Awards are an integral part of the rural sector today – and the visionaries who set it up celebrated a 30th anniversary reunion recently at Karāpiro.
He is also proud of the success of the Agribusiness in Schools programme which he was able to help through securing sponsorship from Gallaghers and Fieldays after the then St Paul’s Collegiate principal Grant Lander shared a vision with him.
“It’s one of those things that align with your values and your beliefs ... we’ve now got 100 schools teaching year 12 and 13 agribusiness and we’ve produced 3000 students. That’s another one of those pinch moments.”
Having worked in and around Fieldays for two decades, Nation was quick to express an interest when the chief executive’s job came up. He was selected from a pool of 67 applicants and after arriving in March 2016 oversaw a successful decade in the role as Fieldays negotiated the digital revolution and Covid.
His decided to retire to his Tamahere lifestyle
block of 27 years last year – and spend more time with family.
He is Waikato Chamber of Commerce chair now and continues to fight the good fight for the rural community – most recently publicly taking on New Zealand Post over its rural delivery service changes.
His finger is still on the button of local issues, he is an avid follower of news – and reading newspapers – and is not short of an opinion on any issue. He will always be an influential ambassador for Fieldays.
“You don’t realise the shadow you cast,” he says of the chief executive role and the annual expo.
But a move into politics, locally or nationally, is certainly not on the cards.
He regards the abuse of local body politicians, particularly on social media as “sickening and disgusting”.
“There are different ways to get involved”. And there is no shortage of work to do at home – a thriving hydroponic set up in the greenhouse, lush lawns to mow, cutting firewood, making use of the big workshop and upstairs offices for he and his wife. Installing a lift is on the cards “when we get old”.
Of his award Nation says it’s for his family – wife Ali, and adult children Samantha and Thomas who have all worked voluntarily for Fieldays - and acknowledges being told “you give back”. J ust like his dad – who will be “so proud”.
Peter Nation checks the hydroponics in his greenhouse.
The office at home is still in constant use for Peter Nation.
Rural roots spark abstract art
By Jon Rawlinson
Drawing on his surroundings, painter
Peter (PJ) Atkins often features the King Country as his character.
“The landscape is a huge influence for me. I just love the land, I love hills. In Matiere, where I grew up, there are hills everywhere – they’re across the whole of the King Country.”
Commonly associated with realism, landscapes can also be produced in a more abstract style. Essentially, PJ portrays the soul of his subject more so than replicating surface appeal.
“I add a touch of fantasy sometimes and I’m tending to lean more towards abstract as I go along,” he said.
“Others call their work ‘abstract landscape’ too. It’s to stop people criticising because the river’s running backwards or something like that,” he said. “If you call it abstract, that covers all bases, or I should say it gives you more room for interpretation.”
In line with many landscape artists, PJ uses watercolours. However, while they add to the look of the finished work, watercolours offer other advantages too, he explained.
“I’ve always painted in watercolours, partly because they’re easy to clean up. I have dabbled in oils, and I would like to do some more, and I also use ink and coloured pencils and watercolour pencils and pens as well.”
Whichever tools he uses from his paint box, PJ is at least as interested in the journey as he is the destination.
“I just like to make a start and then see what happens. Sometimes it’s magic and sometimes it’s not, but I’m an experimenter – I just like mucking around with paint and paper.”
PJ’s mucking around began in high school under the tutelage of Second World War artist, Reverend Ted Lewis.
“I was the only one in the family who was artistically inclined. I never thought that I had much of a talent for art but other people did.
“It was at Whanganui Boys College (now Whanganui City College) in the fifth and sixth form that my interest in art was really encouraged, by the art teacher, Ted Lewis, who had a big influence on my life.”
Raised on a sheep and beef farm, PJ was destined to make a living on the land long before he became focused on landscapes.
“After I left school, I was more interested in being a hippie than having a profession. I was a shepherd for years and years. I started off here in the King Country then took shepherding jobs wherever I could.
“After I married, my wife (Christine Jorgensen) and I bought a small supermarket on the Kāpiti Coast. I also
bought a rural delivery run and I did that for years.”
During this time, work and family commitments meant his art took a backseat.
“I did hardly any art at all for years, but when we moved to Hawkes Bay, I had my own studio, and that’s when I really started getting back into it.”
Five years ago, PJ and Christine moved back to the King Country settling in Maihiihi near Ōtorohanga. Now in his 70s, retirement has finally afforded him more time to pick up the brush.
Artist of the month at The Gallery Ngatea on the Hauraki Plains, PJ’s work was included in a group exhibition – his first – in Ōtorohanga and Te Awamutu late last year.
“It was great. It was really a good experience and it meant a lot to me to have my paintings up on the wall where people could see them.”
Rural Leases
You may be considering that you no longer want to farm your property but also don’t want to sell the land. A good solution here is to consider leasing your property.
A rural land lease is a legally binding agreement between a landowner and a tenant which allows the tenant to use the land for agricultural purposes, such as grazing, cropping, or horticulture, in exchange for rent. The duration, terms, and conditions of leases can vary, and leasing can be beneficial to both parties. Leasing provides an opportunity for young farmers to build an asset base without the costs of purchasing land and can enable farmers to continue to own the land and create a source of income from the land. If you’ve decided a rural lease is what you are looking for, then the next step is to look at the market and the property to consider the land value, rental rates, productivity, profitability, and potential risks and opportunities.
Consultation with your farm advisor, lawyer and accountant can provide expert guidance and assistance on legal, financial, technical, or operational matters.
Before the lease is signed, it is important that the terms of the lease are reviewed and individualised to your property, as matters that are not covered could lead to disputes. Once signed, it is important to regularly review the lease to ensure that it is still fit for purpose.
If a rural lease is what you are looking for, please consult your solicitor to discuss further.
Lucy Sim
Artist PJ Atkins with The Twins
