Crafar, who this month attended the Ahuwhenua Awards in Auckland, leased the Tauhara Moana farm before it was taken over by the receiver and then returned to the trust. He told Dairy News he felt a bit strange being at the awards function. He still resents losing his farms and says none of his sons is working in the dairy industry.
“The bankers just drove our whole family out of farming. In fact they are running around the country saying we’ve got to get young boys and entrepreneurs into farming. But they have driven a whole generation out of farming,” he says.
Crafar lives near Kinloch, just out of Taupo, which backs on to an elite golf course. He has no job and doesn’t play golf. He’s sad that after 31 years he’s no longer part of the dairy industry and still clings to a dream that he might get his farms back. He’s still trying to raise the money.
“The Chinese haven’t got it yet and while they haven’t got it were not going to give up.”
He says the longer he’s out of the dairy industry the less attractive it appears. He’s very critical of the urban community and ‘greenies’.
“The way they jump up and down. Not one of them looks behind them when they get off the toilet to think where their effluent goes. The local authorities could be served with abatement notices every day because they don’t know where the pollution is going. All they do is just put up a sign, ‘don’t eat the shellfish and don’t swim.’ ”
Crafar believes the land he converted to dairying was of real benefit to New Zealand. “We saved a lot of the country from forestry by buying it and converting it. The farms we bought and converted would have been converted to trees and producing bugger all, not making much on carbon credits.”
Crafar says he’s been criticised for living on the edge, but says he was always told “if you weren’t living on the edge you were taking up too much room”.
