Adding value to farming

Speaking this week at the World Farmers Organisation conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Rolleston urged agricultural stakeholders must work together to boost value added returns.

He says increasing the value of products can provide farmers with confidence about their future.

"Developing new products tailored to specific market preferences and needs, provides opportunity for increased farm gate returns, without any increase in volume.
"It is here where we need a close collaboration between farmers, scientists, processors and marketers to communicate market requirements into the science pipeline.

"As farmers, we can sometimes feel disconnected from the end market, yet it is the end market we need to understand most because that determines not just how we farm, but what we farm."

Rolleston suggests we can increase the value of our products by improving our current products or we can create new and novel food products like sweet tasting kiwiberries - products that stimulate demand and maximise returns through premium prices in domestic and international markets.

"So we need scientists to be thinking outside the square as well. Research can take some direction from its users and that is important but as Henry Ford famously said, "If I listened to my customers I would have built a faster horse."