Cuddling cows
OPINION: Years of floods and low food prices have driven a dairy farm in England's northeast to stop milking its cows and instead charge visitors to cuddle them.
OPINION: The Government approved 74 DJs to enter NZ as critical workers during lockdowns, an Official Information Act request reveals. Of these 64 arrived, talking up precious MIQ spots.
The OIA shows that, since June 2021, a total of 1,637 NZ residents applied for an emergency spot in MIQ and were declined. We've all heard the stories of NZ citizens being stopped from returning home to see dying relatives, and similar stories of bureaucratic cruelty.
And we also know that the primary industries - deemed 'Essential' for good reason, and desperate for drivers, pickers, milkers and vets - were knocked back time and time again when pleading for larger MIQ allocations so they could keep providing much-needed earnings for the country.
So, Kiwi citizens and essential workers, 'No', DJs, 'Yes'. Needless to say, the priorities were all wrong.
Rural supply business PGG Wrightson Ltd has bought animal health products manufacturer Nexan Group for $20 million.
While Donald Trump seems to deliver a new tariff every few days, there seems to be an endless stream of leaders heading to the White House to negotiate reciprocal deals.
The challenges of high-performance sport and farming are not as dissimilar as they may first appear.
HortNZ's CEO, Kate Scott says they are starting to see the substantial cumulative effects on their members of the two disastrous flood events in the Nelson Tasman region.
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.