Farmers' call
OPINION: Fonterra's $4.22 billion consumer business sale to Lactalis is ruffling a few feathers outside the dairy industry.
OUTSPOKEN SOUTH Canterbury farmer Leonie Guiney has been elected to the Fonterra board.
Fonterra shareholders have also retained sitting directors John Monaghan and David MacLeod. Three candidates – Grant Rowan, Gray Baldwin and Gary Reymer - missed out; director voting figures are not released by the co-op.
Guiney lives and farms near Fairlie where she is director of four dairy farming companies. She has previous experience as a consulting officer, dairy production lecturer and has studied overseas cooperatives in the Netherlands and Ireland. Guiney was the 2014 winner of the low-input Dairy Business of the Year.
A passionate supporter of Fonterra's co-op model, she was vocal during the TAF process, speaking out against selling share units to investors. TAF was passed by 64% of Fonterra shareholders.
Guiney will join the board at Fonterra's annual meeting in Palmerston North tomorrow.
Shareholders Murray Holdaway and Philip Wilson were elected unopposed as members of the Directors' Remuneration Committee.
In the Shareholders Council elections, Penny Smart, Malcolm Piggott, Wilson James and Ellen Bartlett were elected.
Academic Dr Mike Joy and his employer, Victoria University of Wellington have apologised for his comments suggesting that dairy industry CEOs should be hanged for contributing towards nitrate poisoning of waterways.
Environment Southland's catchment improvement funding is once again available for innovative landowners in need of a boost to get their project going.
The team meeting at the Culverden Hotel was relaxed and open, despite being in the middle of calving when stress levels are at peak levels, especially in bitterly cold and wet conditions like today.
A comment by outspoken academic Dr Mike Joy suggesting that dairy industry leaders should be hanged for nitrate contamination of drinking/groundwater has enraged farmers.
OPINION: The phasing out of copper network from communications is understandable.
Driven by a lifelong passion for animals, Amy Toughey's journey from juggling three jobs with full-time study to working on cutting-edge dairy research trials shows what happens when hard work meets opportunity - and she's only just getting started.
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