While there is no news yet on whether Transpower would appeal Waimate District Council's decision to ignore the former's pylon buffer zone proposals, it seems likely Federated Farmers will appeal the plan to the Environment Court, albeit on different grounds.

New Zealand trucking operators are paying more than double the amount in road taxes for some heavy vehicles compared to their Australian counterparts and that has a direct impact on freight costs for farmers, says Road Transport Forum chief executive officer Ken Shirley.

SEVEN MONTHS ago South Taranaki dairy farmer David Werder was standing in a paddock amongst twisted corrugated roofing that had been a hay barn. Today two new barns are up and his farming operation is back to normal.

WHAKATANE farmer Douglas Bull makes no apologies for being a champion of dairy cooperatives.

DAIRY WOMEN’S Network (DWN) chief executive Sarah Speight is well qualified to encourage other women to ignore ingrained attitudes as they step forward for leadership roles. 

AUSTRALIAN FARMERS are welcoming the Federal Government’s decision to introduce a foreign investment register, announced last week by Prime Minister Julia Gillard at the National Farmers Federation national congress.

IN 1988, farmer George Siemon and six dairy farmer neighbours formed a small cooperative in Wisconsin. Under Siemon’s leadership, CROPP Cooperative (the Cooperative Regions of Organic Producer Pools) has become North America’s largest and most successful organic farmers’ cooperative.

DO YOU know how much grass your best paddock produced compared to your worst? More importantly, do you know why some paddocks perform poorly?

Industry good body DairyNZ says it has the expertise lined-up and waiting for the development and management of a new Dairy Industry Good Animal Database, should Livestock Improvement (LIC) shareholders approve the transfer of the Core Database this month.

IF YOU are making pasture silage this spring, research shows it is worth doing the job properly. A trial in the 1997/98 season at DairyNZ’s No 1 farm compared the milksolids production of cows fed a low pasture allowance plus 5kgDM/cow/day of high- (10.4 MJME/kgDM), medium- (9.4 MJME/kgDM) and low- (8.3 MJME/kgDM) quality pasture silage in spring, summer and autumn.