NZ's handbrake
OPINION: Your old mate gets the sinking feeling that no matter who we vote into power in the hope they will reverse the terminal slide the country is in, there will always be a cohort of naysayers determined to hold us back.
According to the screaming skulls at Greenpeace, all of this country's problems to do with fire, floods, and pestilence are because of farming - particularly livestock farming.
However, the latest Stats NZ figures shows there are now a lot fewer dairy cattle and sheep (down almost 1 million from 2020) on NZ farms.
This is outlined in the latest five-yearly Agricultural Production Census 2022, which was recently released.
It also shows the total number of dairy cattle was 6.1 million at June 2022 - 8% lower than in 2014, when the total dairy cattle herd peaked at 6.7 million.
You'd think Greenpeace would be shouting this big drop in livestock numbers from the hilltops.
