increase font size
Simon Limmer.
Meat company Silver Fern Farms has poached a top executive from Zespri to be its new chief executive next year.
SFF co-chair Rob Hewett says Simon Limmer has excellent skills and his experience will maintain the strong progress made as a food company.
“The board is excited by the leadership Simon will bring to Silver Fern Farms.
“He has deep commercial experience in the food, manufacturing and service sectors in NZ and in several key international markets in which we operate,” Hewett.
Limmer has worked nine years for Zespri in general management roles in NZ and China. Before that he spent 14 years with French multinational Veolia in Europe, East Asia, Oceania and the Americas.
“His experience, most recently with Zespri as their chief operating officer and prior to that as their general manager China, gives us confidence he will be able to continue our development as a consumer-oriented food business,” Hewett says.
“Simon has a clear affinity with NZ agriculture and what is required to successfully take our great products to consumers locally and around the world.”
Limmer says it is exciting to be taking on the leadership of Silver Fern Farms at an important time in the company’s development.
“The company is well-positioned to add value to NZ’s natural grass-fed red meat. There is a consumer trend to natural whole foods, the company has a good brand, is well capitalised and has a talented and enthusiastic group of people.”
Limmer will succeed Dean Hamilton in March next year.
Top CV
Simon Limmer graduated from the University of Waikato with a Bachelor of Management Studies degree.
He was in the Ford Motor Company sales and marketing graduate programme in NZ then worked 14 years for the environmental services company Veolia Environment (CGEA/Onyx) based in Paris, Auckland and UK.
He returned with his family from France in 2008 to become general manager of global supply with Zespri. There he has also worked as general manager grower and government relations, general manager China and since 2014 he has been chief operating officer. Limmer in 2015 attended the Te Hono Movement NZ primary sector ‘bootcamp’ at Stanford University.
Silver Fern Farms chief executive Dan Boulton says the meat processor wants to find ways of getting product destined for Middle East markets into those markets as opposed to try and place them elsewhere.
More than five million trays, or 18,000 tonnes, of Zespri’s RubyRed Kiwifruit will soon be available for consumers across 16 markets this season.
Rural retailer Farmlands has released it's latest round of half-year results, labeling it as evidence that its five-year strategy is delivering on financial performance and better value for members.
Good news for kiwifruit growers - a record crop with forecast per hectare returns at record levels for all fruit categories for the 2025-26 season.
Additional tariffs introduced by the Chinese Government last month on beef imports should favour New Zealand farmers and exporters.
Winning four of the big categories at the 2026 New Zealand Cheese Awards feels special, says Meyer Cheese general manager Miel Meyer.
Local cheesemakers are being urged to embrace competition from imports but also ensure their products are never invisible in the country.
Ireland's Minister of state for Agriculture says it’s hard to explain to Irish farmers the size and scale of NZ farms.
Dairy farming in New Zealand offers career progression and this has motivated 2026 Central Plateau Share Farmers of the Year Navdeep Singh and Jobanpreet Kaur.
A partnership between Canterbury milk processor Synlait and the world's largest food producer, Nestlé, has been celebrated with a visit to a North Canterbury farm by a group including senior staff from Synlait, the Ravensdown subsidiary EcoPond, and Nestlé's Switzerland head office.
Canterbury milk processor Synlait is blaming what it calls "a perfect storm" of setbacks for a big loss in its half year result for the six months ended January 31, 2026.
OPINION: If you ask this old mutt, the choice at the next election isn't shaping up as a contest of…
OPINION: A mate of yours says we're long overdue for a reckoning on what value farmers really get for the…
