NZ arable farmers face global profitability pressures
Profitability issues facing arable farmers are the same across the world, says New Zealand's special agricultural trade envoy Hamish Marr.
A new study is showing dairy and conservation sites can co-exist, and its findings are contributing to an ongoing project restoring natural biodiversity into a dairy farming environment.
'Persistence of biodiversity in a dryland remnant within an intensified dairy farm landscape', looks at Bankside Scientific Reserve, a small (2.6 ha) remnant in Canterbury surrounded by dairy paddocks.
It still has valuable communities of native species, despite being impacted by nitrate and phosphate encroachment, and habitat fragmentation.
It concludes "it does not appear to be an intractable management issue for the interface between agricultural systems and conservation sites within a dairy landscape mosaic".
One of the study's authors, Professor of Ecology, Nick Dickinson, and other Lincoln scientists have been tasked by Ngāi Tahu Farming and Manawhenua from Tuahuriri Marae, to turn the little triangles of land which irrigators in paddocks cannot reach into an oasis for native plants and animals on Ngāi Tahu's Eyrewell dairy farm.
Professor Dickinson says the study shows there are "means and ways" to restore natural biodiversity into a dairy farming environment, and the Ngai Tāhu Farming project was an example, covering 150ha on 17 reserves, with a similar additional amount of native species being planted on paddock borders and under irrigators.
These create conditions for more than 65 species of plants to regenerate, and also provide corridors for insects and birds between the reserves.
The research hinges on finding the benefits to the farmer of doing this, to encourage more native planting, he says.
In an ever-changing world, things never stay completely the same. Tropical jungles can turn into concrete ones criss-crossed by motorways, or shining cities collapse into ghost towns.
Labour's agriculture spokesperson Jo Luxton says while New Zealand needs more housing, sacrificing our best farmland to get there is not the answer.
Profitability issues facing arable farmers are the same across the world, says New Zealand's special agricultural trade envoy Hamish Marr.
Over 85% of Fonterra farmer suppliers will be eligible for customer funding up to $1,500 for solutions designed to drive on-farm efficiency gains and reduce emissions intensity.
Tighter beef and lamb production globally have worked to the advantage of NZ, according to the Meat Industry Association (MIA).
Managing director of Woolover Ltd, David Brown, has put a lot of effort into verifying what seems intuitive, that keeping newborn stock's core temperature stable pays dividends by helping them realise their full genetic potential.
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