MANAGEMENT
MACHINERY & PRODUCTS
ANIMAL HEALTH
Focus group shares farmer problems. PAGE 24
Sam Whitelock locked in as MF ambassador. PAGE 32
Lepto study reveals new challenges. PAGE 30
TO ALL FARMERS, FOR ALL FARMERS OCTOBER 25, 2022: ISSUE 762
www.ruralnews.co.nz
‘What the hell?’ PETER BURKE
peterb@ruralnews.co.nz
CONFUSION AND outright anger reign across rural New Zealand as farmers and communities try to get to the bottom of the Labour Government’s proposal to effectively make a large number of sheep and beef farmers unprofitable in its quest to get them to pay for their agricultural emissions. There have been claims the Government is prioritising trees over food and questions have been asked as to whether the move is brave or stupid. While farmers have consistently stated their willingness to pay for these emissions, PM Jacinda Ardern’s announcement from a hay bale stage at a dairy farm in the Wairarapa a couple of weeks ago was not what farmers were expecting. As Rural News went to print farmers around the country were preparing to take to the streets and motorways to express their opposition to the emissions pricing proposal. Under the proposal, the Government states its intent to reduce emissions by 10% by 2030 and that farmers will start paying for their emissions by 2025. But according to Federated Farmers president, Andrew Hoggard, this plan put up by government will cause massive economic and social consequences in rural communities. He says the plan would see sheep and beef production drop by up to 20% and dairy by 5% and at a cost to NZ of $3 billion.
Groundswell New Zealand co-founder Bryce McKenzie all ready to spearhead last week’s nationwide protest against the Government’s emissions pricing plan.
The 94 page ‘consultation’ document is a response to the much lauded He Waka Eke Noa (HWEN) submission put to government in May, which offered an alternative to the earlier Green-led scenario to put agriculture into the ETS.
Protect your herd and your bottom line
HWEN is a consortium of all the rural sector groups and they, after much consultation with farmers and growers, came up with a consensus proposal and this was put to government. At the time, the proposal was hailed
by DairyNZ, B+LNZ and others as a win-win solution that offered the best solution. Four months on, the same leaders are not happy chappies and it seems that government did not rubber stamp their proposal. Andrew Morrison, chair of B+LNZ,
one of the key members of HWEN, says he’s “perplexed” at what’s appeared in the document. He told Rural News that HWEN spent two and half years working up its proposal in conjunction with MPI and MFE and what they came up with in the end was a very finely balanced solution. He says government were told this and warned that if they got the price wrong, or didn’t have the tools to do the job, there would be problems. “In our mind we just need to know what the story is here. Under the government proposal, sheep and beef farmers have the potential to be the most affected. Nobody wants that and HWEN would never support a proposal that makes the farming sector unviable – let’s be clear about that,” he says. Morrison says they will now look carefully at the document and come back with a collective response and ask that the settings for charging farmers are correct. He says they are still trying to work out why government walked away from what was a fair and equitable proposal by HWEN. He says if they don’t get a satisfactory response “it’s game on”. “We can’t have rural NZ decimated and we would never support that. We have worked in good faith in partnership and so now we have to quickly sort out why government has failed to deliver on some of our recommendations,” he says. TO PAGE 4
Use Bovilis® BVD for 12 months of proven fetal protection.* The longest coverage available. Exposure to BVD could mean your unborn calves become Persistently Infected (PI’s) - spreading BVD amongst your herd. It’s estimated that up to 65% of New Zealand’s beef herds are infected with the BVD virus at any given time. The convenience of the longest coverage available along with flexible dosing intervals# means you can protect this season’s calves no matter when they are conceived.
Avoid an outbreak. Ask your vet about vaccinating with Bovilis BVD or visit bovilis.co.nz *Following a third dose (annual vaccine) Bovilis BVD provides 12 months fetal protection. # Interval between dose 1 (sensitiser) and dose 2 is from 4 weeks to 6 months. 3rd dose given as annual single dose. AVAILABLE ONLY UNDER VETERINARY AUTHORISATION. ACVM No’s: A011866. Schering-Plough Animal Health Ltd. Ph: 0800 800 543. www.msd-animal-health.co.nz Copyright © 2022 Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA and its affiliates. All rights reserved. NZ-BOV-220700002