Guardian Farming February 2012

An Ashburton Guardian Advertising Feature

Guardian

farming interesting • informative • essential

A leading light in the farming scene pages 4, 5

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February 2012

Page 2

GUARDIAN FARMING

Water management - are you prepared Neal Shaw, ATS Chief Executive

T

ime is running out for farmers to comply with the first round of the new National Regulations for water measuring.

Government initiative aimed at creating better management of New Zealand’s freshwater.

The Resource Management (Measurement and Reporting of Water Takes) Regulations 2010 became a reality in November of that year and since then farmers have been put on a time-line to comply with the requirement to have all water takes of more than five litres a second metered.

The staggered approach to the introduction of this legislation meant existing consent holders had between two and six years to comply depending on their water take allocations. Now the first wave of consent holders is nearing the first deadline.

Farmers accessing more than 20 litres per second need to have a water measuring and reporting system installed by November 10 this year. It might sound a long way off, but the reality is that it’s only nine months away.

These regulations were a central

Locally Environment Canterbury is charged with issuing and monitoring water consents and consequently the implementation of these consent conditions.

For several months Environment Canterbury staff have been urging farmers to act quickly to avoid a lastminute rush and increasing costs to install the necessary equipment as required under the regulations.

Nationally there are around 12,000 consents requiring water measuring equipment and around 42 per cent of these are in Canterbury – the highest proportion in New Zealand.

In the Ashburton Water Management Zone there are 2095 water takes that need a water measuring device. At the time of writing this, only around 18 per cent of surface water takes and 44 per cent of ground water takes complied

farming Advertising: Phone 307-7900 Email: emma.j@theguardian.co.nz Publication date: February 14, 2012 Next issue: March 6, 2012 An advertising feature for the Ashburton Guardian. Any opinions expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of Guardian Farming or the Ashburton Guardian.

created around the district, or through other protection methods as provided by central and local government.

Many of us can be guilty of procrastination, especially if we don’t place much importance on the task at hand. It is fair to say some farmers will see these regulations as a nuisance and an inconvenience.

There are many other initiatives being implemented with water quality at its core. One is the Clean Streams Accord which was established to minimise the impact of dairying on New Zealand’s streams, rivers, lakes and wetlands. The Accord specifies targets to keep dairy cattle out of these waterways, to improve treatment of farm effluent, and to better manage the use of fertilisers and other nutrients.

But these National Regulations for water measuring should be welcomed as an additional on-farm management tool aimed at improving productivity and efficiency and not bemoaned as just another compliance cost to farmers.

Results to date are positive with the MAF Stock Exclusion Survey, released late last year, showing good progress being made – especially in Canterbury with our region’s compliance rate being one of the highest in the country.

Farmers already measure on-farm performance in other aspects of their operations, and these regulations provide the opportunity to further extend that. Measuring assists performance and ultimately reduces costs.

The survey was based on an independent assessment of 587 Fonterra dairy supply farms throughout New Zealand and was conducted between March and May 2011. In Canterbury 65.4 per cent of dairy farms had complete stock exclusion (compared with a national rate of 42.1 per cent), 78.2 per cent of streams had complete stock exclusion (57 per cent nationally), and 93.8 per cent of stream banks had fences or barriers to exclude stock (78.4 per cent nationally).

These sorts of regulations provide the opportunity to create generational changes in behaviour, and it is our generation facing the challenges and responsibility of change so we can leave things in good shape for future generations.

interesting • informative • essential

Please direct any correspondence to: Amanda Niblett, on 307-7927 email: amanda.n@theguardian.co.nz or to: Linda Clarke, on 307-7971 email: linda.c@theguardian.co.nz or write to PO Box 77, Ashburton.

ECan staff warn that if there is a lastminute rush there could be a shortage of equipment and labour, forcing possible cost blow-outs for farmers if installers have to contract out their services to meet the demand.

There are also the environmental benefits to consider. Farmers are recognised as being stewards of the land, and part of that responsibility extends to managing our water resources.

Guardian

Any feedback is welcome, any comments about our magazine, letters or story suggestions.

with the regulations.

With the huge growth in water usage over recent years, it is necessary to put steps in place to capture and manage water with facilities such as the vast number of water storage ponds being

Both the Clean Streams Accord and the National Regulations for Water Measuring provide an opportunity to establish sustainable, productive and cost effective practices.

It is important our farming community continue to embrace these initiatives for their own benefit and the next generation.

The penalties for not complying are likely to be heavy – financially, morally and ethically.

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Page 3

Winchmore update - January John Carson

I

t seems as if 2012 has just started and already the first month has gone but we still have 11 months to accomplish all that we have put on our “to-do” list for this year . . . right?

I know that I always have more ideas and thoughts about the year ahead than I could ever hope to achieve but it never stops me from having a good crack at getting them all ticked off my list.

I think there is something about January that makes people feel enthusiastic and inspired because it is the start of the year and we are fresh and keen to see what lies ahead.

Rainfall to date is 49.8mm which is not very far behind the long term average for January of 61.3mm. Average maximum air temperature is 21.9°C which surprisingly is only 0.1°C below the long-term average of 22°C, with the soil temperatures at an average of 17.0°C which is the normal long-term temperature.

of poplar trees that I thought were in a reasonably sheltered paddock.

Another 21 ha of surplus growth has been made into hay, reducing the need to purchase as much straw as we estimated we would need for the winter cow grazing.

Fortunately the timing has been right as these paddocks have freshened up in time to take some of the 450 science ewe lambs from Woodlands AgResearch Farm in Invercargill and 600 lambs from Invermay AgResearch Farm in Mosgiel, although just over 300 of these have since gone up to the Lincoln Farm to be used with pasture endophyte trial work up there.

The Woodlands ewe lambs will be staying here until next January to be trucked back as two-tooths as replacements in a breeding programme they are running down there.

The maize has only just started to flower which is almost two weeks later than last year.

The remainder lambs, one mob of the science ewes and the rams have been shorn. Sixty-two young weaned beef cross calves have arrived to be used in a parasite and mixed grazing trial very similar to the trials run last year.

The strong winds have not damaged it in anyway, although we have lost the top and some big branches off a couple

The 89 carry over dairy cows are in two mobs and doing great work tidying up a few of the smaller paddocks that were

The maize has only just started to flower which is almost two weeks later than last year. out of control and too difficult for the hay making machinery to get into.

The immediate aim for now is to have the paddocks prepared and ready to maximise the autumn growth, some of which will be required to carry over into the winter.

As from tomorrow, I am away on leave, taking a good look down along the West Coast. Having never been there I am looking forward to exploring all that it has.

Somehow I think that three weeks will not be long enough.

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GUARDIAN FARMING

R E Y V R CO TO S

A leading light in the farming scene P

hil McKendry turns 50 this year, and he’s thinking about running a marathon to mark the occasion.

The busy farmer runs regularly to keep physically and mentally fit, for he is a leading light in Mid Canterbury’s progressive farming scene.

McKendry and wife Judith own a 200ha mixed cropping farm on Lyndhurst Road. Their three children Ella, 15, Tom, 14, and George, 12 go to school in nearby Methven. Judith also works off the farm as a teacher at Lauriston School.

Phil is the fourth generation McKendry to farm on the property and combines farm work with roles as chairman of Ashburton Trading Society (ATS), a director of Electricity Ashburton, and long-serving board member at Our Lady of the Snows School. He was the founding chairman of Barrhill Chertsey Irrigation (BCI) Company and has other business projects on the go, including home renovations which will result in a spacious new office on-farm where he can keep track of everything.

He is a farmer who thinks big for the district good. He is not put off by paperwork, governance roles do not faze him. It started with BCI, navigating a tricky landscape of resource consents over three years to use water from the Rakaia River for irrigation.

PHOTO KIRSTY GRAHAM 310112-KG-058

Phil McKendry checks the state of cut ryegrass while waiting for the weather to clear.

While he was not at the helm of the company when water in the scheme began to flow last summer, he takes pride in the fact it has now been accomplished at a time when water is as precious as gold.

With just one child now at OLOS, McKendry will resign

soon after 11 years on the school board. He has been an elected member of the ATS board for just as long, and last December became chairman – replacing John Low. McKendry said ATS had a successful regional niche in the farming market that worked for its shareholders.

“ATS is the reason that the local farm supplies market is the most competitive in the country. It is well supported by a network of progressive and innovative farm supplies, processing and marketing infrastructure.”

ATS has grown in the past 12 years from a turnover of around $80 million, to one of $210 million. That growth was on the back of development on farms.

“There has been a lot of development on farm with irrigation. Farmers are spending more.”

He said the co-operative’s dairy offering was strong and would grow further, as the dairy wave continued to wash over the district.

McKendry says he has no immediate plans to convert his own farm, despite milking cows being an attractive and competitive land use.

He grows ryegrass, wheat, Watties process peas, hybrid radish, maize and linseed, and is fattening up some store lambs.

He does not mourn the loss of rich cropping soils to dairying. “Land use is always changing on the Canterbury Plains. Irrigation makes that possible.”

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Page 5

Linda Clarke, Ashburton Guardian rural reporter

While ATS had been well placed to take advantage of the huge money farmers are spending on development, loyalty was not a given. Mid Canterbury’s progressive farming community ensured the co-operative was kept on its toes.

McKendry says he feels old when he considers how agriculture has advanced in the past few decades. It had bounced back from being a sunset industry in the 1980s’ Rogernomics era, using science and technology to create some of the best farmers in the world.

That robust agricultural industry was perfectly placed to play a future role helping feed the world. “It is our time, and the fact we are the most isolated country in the world is actually a benefit.”

He predicts more intensive land use, limited only by water.

“The last 30 years have shown huge growth and it will be a challenge getting water where we need it.”

Plans to use Lake Coleridge for bulk water storage for the province were important and were part of the water development and enhancement of existing schemes.

The pendulum would continue to swing between using water commercially and for community good. “Farmers know that water is a community asset, even though they may privately own the infrastructure.”

McKendry said Kiwi farmers were among world leaders when it came to producing more food with less water, using science, and rural towns and cities recognised agriculture’s importance.

But while technology is a big boost, it can’t make the sun shine and what McKendry would like right now is a couple of weeks of fine weather.

PHOTO KIRSTY GRAHAM 310112-KG-042

Ploughing through the paperwork is no problem for Phil.

With so much on his plate, it is little wonder his morning runs are akin to zen time.

Phil and wife Judith.

PHOTO KIRSTY GRAHAM 310112-KG-047

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Survey of plains native vegetation Contributed by Mary Ralston, Forest and Bird

T

his summer a survey of the native vegetation on the Canterbury Plains is being carried out. The aim is to identify the remaining patches and remnants of native vegetation on public land so that they can be protected.

spraying and removal when fences are replaced.

A survey was last undertaken in the 1990s. Some areas of native plants that were identified then have since been lost, such as the kanuka along the roadside near the Harris Scientific Reserve. When this current survey is complete it is hoped that measures will be taken to physically protect some of the remnants by fencing them off and identifying them with signs.

The survey, which has been organised by the Ashburton Community Conservation Trust in conjunction with the Ashburton District Council and ECan, is addressing one of the targets of the recently developed Canterbury Water Management Strategy: that there should be no further loss of dryland vegetation on the plains.

Mike Harding says they have found some new remnants, which is good news, but there have been significant losses along roadsides, mainly due to the change of conditions that occur when dryland farms are converted to dairying.

The survey is being undertaken by ecologist Mike Harding of Geraldine who is identifying sites of native vegetation between State Highway 72 and the coast.

The highly productive farmland of the Canterbury plains is a very altered landscape compared to what was here before people arrived. Forest extended down onto the plains from the foothills, and there would have been lots of scrub with species such as matagouri, coprosma and flax.

Kanuka was found in drier areas, and the gravelly channels of old riverbeds would have contained native grasses and herbs well adapted to harsh conditions.

Wetlands flourished and were home to a multitude of different plants and

PHOTO SUPPLIED

Alice Shanks (left) and Val Clemens studying a new native plant found during a survey of the native plants on the Canterbury Plains. Remaining native plants on the plains are often threatened when dryland farms are converted to dairying.

Irrigation development often means roadsides are used and managed more intensively and they often are watered, sprayed or mown.

supported many native birds.

Now there is less than 1 per cent of this original vegetation left on the plains.

development, mainly because people don’t realise they are valuable examples of what we have lost.

This makes the remaining patches very valuable from an ecological and historical point of view – they are living museum pieces. Even though they are now so rare, fragments are still being lost when roadsides are grazed or fencelines pulled out to facilitate irrigation

There are only a handful of sites of native vegetation that the public would see when they travelled around our area.

The cabbage trees along the roadside at Barrhill are a distinctive group, and even the survival of these distinctive specimens are threatened by mowers,

The Ashburton Community Conservation Trust is interested in hearing from farmers who think they may have some native vegetation on their property, or on the roadside adjacent to their farms.

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Page 7

The Crafar saga John Leadley

R

eturning from Australia last week and catching up with a week’s reading I found a certain irony in the two headlines of Guardian January 28 on page 8.

One entitled Chinese get Crafar Farms, trumpeted the announcement by Ministers’ Coleman and Williamson who oversee decisions of the Overseas Investment Office (OIO). The sale for a purported $210 million for the 16 North Island Crafar farms (still to get final confirmation) was the result of over two years work by receivers.

It would be great to see the end of this sorry saga. I only hope some serious lessons have been learnt by those involved in allowing the Crafar situation to develop.

Lesson One. Big is not always beautiful. Much better to be sustainable and efficient.

Lesson Two. Enthusiasm and energy alone do not make for a successful business operation. Business skills are an important attribute for success.

Lesson Three. Equity is key.

Irresponsible financial advisers and over optimistic lending institutions had a shameful role in the Crafar saga. Beware bad advice.

Lesson Four. Animal welfare is paramount. National and international TV portrayal of the effects of overstocking and poor onfarm management hugely damages the image of our major single export commodity.

Lesson Five. Farm “ownership,” if that’s the word, is not only about effective animal or crop production.

Most importantly it’s about being responsible custodians of the land resource through environmental safe guards.

China’s record of being the most polluted nation on earth does little to add credibility to the so called environmental safeguards and enhancements purportedly built into the OIO deal.

Queue of cash buyers for dairy farms So states the other well researched article on page 8 of the same Guardian publication.

It states, quoting a well respected local rural estate source, “Buyers outnumber sellers with most looking in the $10 million price range, with only a small (often exaggerated) number of prospective overseas buyers. Values being up 15 per cent on those of a year ago.”

The good news is that although prices are higher, they are now based on a productivity and payout basis with banks ensuring that this is the case. Banks appear to be lending only on a compelling business case, not on speculation.

This is a much more responsible attitude, but one that has taken a

the statement about overseas land sales “I’d hate to see New Zealanders as tenants in their own country.” Yeah!

long time to learn.

Remember also that we re-elected a government opposed to the introduction of a capital gains tax, which would discourage land speculation. Not a good move!

Maybe the so called “bonus” price could be utilised to help more local young farmers on the ladder of farm ownership.

OIO’s acknowledgement that the deal will add a further five to eight jobs is a poor return on $210 million.

I’m not totally opposed to overseas investment in land, but do wonder if I could purchase land in China on the pretext of increasing land productivity, and betterment of the environment.

This I very much doubt.

It seems a pity this “queue of cash buyers” could not be matched with the forced sale of established (though run down) ex Crafar properties. It would appear these prospective buyers have the resources to bring the 16 properties back to full production quite rapidly.

Many urban and metropolitan Kiwis seem to have trouble accepting the importance of land-based industries to their own living standards, and seem keen to focus on the environmental issues.

an industry where we lead the world in productivity, are New Zealanders or New Zealand dominated entities.

The sale clause relating to Landcorp actually running the farms gives some comfort in that respect.

Surely preferable to further overseas Back in 2010, John Key made investment with profits going off shore.

Recent fines imposed by the courts for blatant breaches of effluent disposal resource consents are fortunately becoming more meaningful. There is a vast difference between a minor ponding due to mechanical malfunction and deliberately placing an effluent hose in a stream during the hours of darkness.

My own view is that there is no place in the industry for the perpetrators of the latter offence.

It is incumbent on the supply company involved to publicly notify what action it is taking.

Most farmers by nature are environmentalists; the few that push the boundaries deliberately should be named and shamed.

My definition of a good farmer is one who achieves high productivity during his/her tenure while enhancing the product potential of the soil resource for those who follow. That is sustainability in my view. Most reach that goal – many below the radar of media publicity.

Yes the dairy industry is vital to New Zealand’s economy, both now and in the foreseeable future.

If we must have overseas ownership of land to survive, in my view certainly not the case; why not a few thousand hectares of the new DoC Estate which appears through under resourcing to be rapidly reverting back to non productivity?

Why do we need overseas ownership to make the most of our very best soil resource? Blatant cherry picking!

Surely the best people to own and operate New Zealand business in

I saw the same negativity in Australia in respect of mining expansion, an industry paralleling dairying in New Zealand in importance to their trade figures.

We too need to do a much better job of educating “Joe Public”.

I’ll happily welcome migrants from any country in the world to live and work in this wonderful country. I note that most have a work ethic I find preferable to

many beneficiary dependent New Zealanders.

According to figures from the Sunday Star Times of February 5, 2012, in the past five years 872,313 hectares of land has been sold to overseas interests.

This represents almost 10 per cent of the total urban, pastoral or horticultural land in the country.

Clearly this should not continue.

For generations new settlers from many nations have come to New Zealand, worked, settled and gained ownership in all sorts of farming and business enterprises. Locally and nationally the dairy industry in particular has benefitted hugely by their expertise and business skills.

This is a vastly different scenario to the Crafar proposal.

Whittling away our most precious resource to overseas investors when our own citizens appear able and willing to maximise returns for the benefit of the whole nation, is simply not sound decision making.

I believe the government could and should have done better.

Page 8

GUARDIAN FARMING

Climate change may shrink wheat crops M

ore intense heat waves due to global warming could diminish wheat crop yields around the world through premature ageing, according to a study published in Nature Climate Change.

“These results imply that warming presents an even greater challenge to wheat than implied by previous modelling studies, and that the effectiveness of adaptations will depend on how well they reduce crop sensitivity to very hot days,” the researchers concluded.

Current projections based on computer models underestimate the extent to which hotter weather in the future will accelerate this process, the researchers warned.

The world’s nations, under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), have said that Earth’s average temperature should not exceed the pre-industrial benchmark by more than 2°C if dangerous warming impacts are to be avoided.

Wheat is harvested in temperate zones on more than 220 million hectares, making it the most widely grown crop on Earth.

On current trends - if there is no major reduction in the emission of heat-trapping greenhouse gases - the global thermometer could rise by twice as much, according to scientists.

In some nations, the grain accounts for up to 50 per cent of calorie intake and 20 per cent of protein nutrition, according to the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), near Mexico City.

In 2010, drought and wildfires in wheat-exporting Russia pushed world prices of the grain to two-year highs, underscoring the vulnerability of global supplies to weathe - and climate-related disruptions.

Greenhouse experiments have shown that unseasonably warm temperatures - especially at the end of the growing season - can cause senescence, the scientific term for accelerated ageing.

Excess heat beyond the plant’s tolerance zone damages photosynthetic cells.

Fluctuations in wheat yields in India have also been attributed by farmers to temperature, most recently a heat wave in 2010 blamed for stunting plant productivity.

“Even changes that were once considered rather extreme scenarios, such as a 4°C in global mean temperature, ... could happen as soon as the early 2060s,” the study notes.

Wheat crops are susceptible to not only rising temperatures, but also aggressive new forms of wheat rust disease.

To further test these experiments and first-hand observations, a trio of researchers led by David Lobell of Stanford University sifted through nine years of satellite data for the Indo-Ganges Plains in northern India and then used statistical methods to isolate the effects of extreme heat on wheat.

They found that a 2°C increase above long-term averages shortened the growing season by a critical nine days, reducing total yield by up to 20 per cent.

Wheat also faces another possibly climate-related threat: aggressive new strains of wheat rust disease have decimated up to 40 per cent of harvests in some regions of north Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia.

Wheat rust is a fungal disease that attacks the stems, grains and especially the leaves of grains including wheat, barley and rye.

Global warming and increased variability of rainfall have weakened the plants even as these emerging rust strains have adapted to extreme temperatures not seen before, scientists say.

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Page 10

GUARDIAN FARMING

It’s time for innovation, solutions

By Dr William Rolleston, Vice-President of Federated Farmers, Chief Executive of South Pacific Sera and Chairperson of the Ministry of Science and Innovation’s Innovation Board

D

oes agriculture represent the ‘old’ economy or could it form a core part of a new and dynamic one?

reputation for safe, reliable and high quality food and backed by science using methods, which in themselves, are environmentally responsible.

As a biotechnologist, a medical doctor and vice-president of Federated Farmers, I know our biological economy has boundless opportunity. Not only does biology produce the food and fibre the world needs but it also lays the platform to create new industries as it starts with what we are truly good at; innovation.

There are seven billion mouths to feed on the planet now and that is expected to grow to over nine billion by 2050. A 2011 United Nations report concluded that to keep pace with global population growth by 2050, developed countries will need to produce 70 per cent more food. For the developing world that figure is 100 per cent and failure risks unprecedented global disorder.

The Arab Spring is one portent to a world without food because it didn’t start over rising sea levels in the Gulf of Tunis, but over the price of bread.

This pressure to increase food production comes at a time when the land area available for food production is in decline due to desertification and urban sprawl. It is something we’ve seen in New Zealand according to recent work by Landcare Research.

It seems 10 per cent of our high quality

As a result of greater affluence, families are becoming smaller and children ever more precious to those families. Parents will prioritise safe, reliable and nutritional food for their children and life prolonging products for themselves. This is the qualitative opportunity for New Zealand.

It is only through efforts such as these crop trials will we be able to feed the millions of hungry mouths world-wide. farmland has been lost to ‘lifestyle blocks’, many of which are not particularly productive.

New Zealand inventions but New Zealand farmers and scientists adopted and adapted them to create global leadership.

In land terms it is equivalent to well over 100 Crafar Farms or more than half the land area in dairy production. In 1960, the world had 0.44 hectares in food production for every single person but by 2050, this is forecast to have fallen to 0.15 hectares.

The world needs a second green revolution and New Zealand is ideally placed to lead it, provided we can overcome self-imposed limits.

In the 1960s the green revolution gave agriculture a quantum lift in production. I am not talking about the political movement but the introduction of pesticides, fertiliser and new hybrid seeds. These were not

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That the human race is growing by two people every second creates immense opportunity for the biological economy.

We must play our part in feeding a growing world and science will help us achieve this.

We need to use all our skills and knowledge in the biological and the physical sciences to increase our production and the value of our products.

As a farmer and a scientist, I acknowledge there are environmental constraints in agriculture but our response shouldn’t be to demand that we just do less of what we are doing. Our response should be to seek new ways of achieving our goals through innovation. In other words, innovation not deprivation.

Solutions will come through a blend of biological and physical sciences; the Greenhouse Gas Research Consortium being one example of this. We also have lessons to learn from organics but our adoption of any organic practices must be led by science rather than dogma and PR. Organics as an industry in its own right is acutely vulnerable to changes in fashion and has taken a hit from the global recession; Fonterra for one is cutting its organic supply base. Sustainable products will be those which underpin our

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Sciences, such as biotechnology, provide the means to multiply the value of the commodities we excel in producing. Take a recent study supported by Fonterra and published in a British Medical Journal. It found skim milk fortified with naturally occurring dairy ingredients may reduce the frequency and intensity of gout flares.

It is estimated gout affects one per cent of people in China or 15 million sufferers.

While the commercial product is still several years away, there is one in development.

If we are to be true leaders in agriculture in leading a second Green Revolution, we mustn’t constrain ourselves to old technologies. We should instead be prepared to consider new technologies such as genetic modification and nanotechnology where we can be certain it will benefit our economy and our environment.

In September, the Agricultural Biotechnology International Conference will be held in Rotorua. As a biotechnologist, this is our equivalent to the Rugby World Cup because it gives New Zealand a global shop window that could yield investment in New Zealand-led science.

A caveat hinges on having the right science ecosystem allowing research and its outcomes to be commercially realised here, in New Zealand.

Agriculture provides the economy with its skeleton and it is up to the physical but especially the biological sciences, to make the most of our core competitive advantage represented by land, soil, water and people.

Agriculture provides the springboard and critical mass for both our biological and physical science economies to flourish. We should embrace and celebrate this. When we finally do, it will drive our economy much higher up the value chain.

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Tonic Plantain A useful tool in the lamb production toolbox Recent research at Agricom has highlighted the benefits of Tonic plantain in lamb production systems.

Over 4 years (Figure 1), using both mixed aged ewes and hoggets, lamb weaning weights were significantly heavier when grazing Tonic than for perennial ryegrass during lactation. This benefit ranged from 10% to over 30%.

Most of this was probably a result of improved milk production of the ewe and increased drymatter (DM) intake of the lamb over the lactation period.

The early-spring activity of Tonic is critical in the success of this system.

Heavier lambs at weaning increase the number attracting early season premiums and reduce the total amount of feed required which both have significant benefits for production systems.

Another important factor in using Tonic during lactation is the ability to maintain

or even improve the liveweight of ewes over lactation. Ewe liveweight during lactation was measured in three of the four studies, presented in Figure 1 and these are shown in Figure 2 .

Ewes grazing ryegrass lost or at best maintained liveweight over lactation.

This represents the energy demand of lactation. Ewes on Tonic were able to increase liveweight primarily due to their ability to eat more than those on ryegrass. Heavier ewes at weaning reduced the need to increase liveweight over the summer which is of particular benefit in environments where summer is a period of feed deficit.

Heavier ewes at weaning can have a direct financial outcome where cull ewes are being sold after their final lactation.

To find out more information on how Tonic plantain can help you on your farm contact Agricom today on 0800 183 358.

Some of the Standout Points from Current Tonic Plantain Research 1. The speed of recovery after hot and dry conditions.

2. The high level of drymatter production through late-autumn, winter and early-spring.

3. Ewe and lamb weaning liveweight meeting people’s expectations.

4. The reduced dag production in sheep.

5. A high level of stock health.

Study 1 Judson 2008 (109 day lactation) Study 2 Judson et al 2009 (95 day lactation) Study 3 Judson et al 2009 (87 day lactation) Study 4 Judson 2010 unpublished hogget lambing (hogget 90 day lactation)

An ideal source of minerals for animal health and performance.

Valuable year-round growth, especially in winter and early spring.

Adding Tonic to your pasture mix is an easy way to add value and diversity.

Tonic can give increased liveweight gain to lambs and ewes in a sole stand situation.

To find out how Tonic can maximise production on your farm, contact 0800 183 358, visit www.agricom.co.nz or visit your local seed merchant.

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Always ready when disaster calls Linda Clarke, Ashburton Guardian rural reporter

N

o news is good news for Allan Baird, volunteer co-ordinator of the Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust.

Those things could still happen after a quake. “The next one could be different, we are still prepared for anything.”

The trust helps farmers and others living rurally to survive disasters like snow, high winds, floods and, most recently, earthquakes.

Allan said like urban folk, rural people and farmers ranged from “the extremely wellprepared” to the “very unprepared” in the event of a disaster. Experience is perhaps the biggest learning path.

The trust has a special team of emergency responders, though sometimes it is asked to facilitate a dignified exit for a single farmer in financial or other trouble.

Improving technology meant that weather forecasters were increasingly picking the big storms that would bring snow. Nature’s timing helped.

Allan’s day job involves selling and servicing computers, and it allows him to keep tabs on the stream of daily emails that might suggest a weather bomb is on its way.

“Farmers in the high country bring their stock down for winter. That June 2006 snow was three weeks early and a lot of stock were still out.”

He always answers the phone, as his home number is the forward point for the trust’s emergency call line.

The Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust was set up in 1991, the first of its kind in the country after MAF stopped co-ordinating emergency response work for farmers. Allan said it was called out twice the following year, to help farmers struggling with heavy snowfalls.

The trust wasn’t called upon then officially until 2002, when another heavy snow caused devastation in the high country. And four years later came the big snow of 2006.

Allan said there were plenty of visits made to individual farmers in the intervening years, when flooding or other adverse

PHOTO KIRSTY GRAHAM 010212-KG-014

Action station: Allan Baird keeps tabs on potential weather disasters for Mid Canterbury farmers.

He was hounded by media for sound bites, comments, television takes. He bought a hands-free phone kit for his car, and quickly The 1992 snow, which struck at lambing learned how to get his point across on radio, time, sticks in his memory. “It was heartbreaking, the amount of stock that was or TV. lost. We had guys from the army working 10 Surprisingly, it was not the physical effects hours a day disposing of dead stock.” of the quake that hurt farmers, who simply cannot walk away from stock and crops.

Canterbury’s earthquakes over the past 18 months cast Allan in a different role. He was It was how the big shake, and continuing based at Rolleston, co-ordinating agencies aftershocks, affected the decision-making and thinking processes of normal, trying to help farmers in the aftermath of functioning people. the September 4, 2010, quake. weather created isolated problems.

Farmers slept under their kitchen tables, their wives in caravans in the middle of paddocks. Many could not make simple decisions; many more could not bring themselves to ask for help.

Allan said the trust team had expected to see a major breakdown in stockwater and irrigation infrastructure, and even the shifting of whole groundwater aquifers, following a major shake. None of that happened.

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“We had experience in snow, and fire, and localised flooding. But in an earthquake we have always said we really didn’t know what to expect. The biggest issue we had identified, apart from damage to property and buildings, was irrigation and stockwater.

We thought they would be seriously affected, but they held up unbelievably well.

“The RDR was a big concern, and loss of stockwater was an issue. Stock can last without feed for a few days, but not without water.”

On the flatland, the increasing number of dairy conversions, often with the removal of shelter belts, had made the district susceptible to strong winds. He says openended cow sheds would lose their roofs in a repeat of the winds of 1975. Centre pivots in most parts of the district were unlikely to stay intact either.

Allan said the only weather Mid Canterbury needed now was a month of sunshine, so farmers could make the most of a potentially bumper harvest.

From the disaster file: August 1975. A northwesterly windstorm hit Canterbury. The winds caused millions of dollars worth of damage to forest plantations.

March 1986. Large areas of South Canterbury flooded. Two thousand people were evacuated and one person died.

Damage was estimated at $60 million.

August 1992. This snowfall was one of the largest recorded in Christchurch, with around 25cm falling in the city. The snowstorm killed over a million livestock in Canterbury and the economic impact was estimated at between $50 to $100 million.

June 2006. Snow fell across almost all of Canterbury on June 12. Snow depths of up to 30cm were recorded at sea level between Temuka and Rakaia, and up to 80cm on the upper Canterbury Plain.

Ashburton experienced its greatest snowfall on record – 38cm. Large areas were without power for up to four weeks.

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Page 13

IAF application signals milestone Contributed by IrrigationNZ – www.irrigationnz.co.nz

T

he $35 million Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry’s Irrigation Acceleration Fund (IAF) has had its first successful applicant. The IAF will contribute $1.67 million to the Ruataniwha Plains Water Storage Project Feasibility Study in the Hawkes Bay. This study will support a decision about whether a water storage option for the Ruataniwha Plains is feasible and commercially viable. The Hawkes Bay Regional Council is matching this contribution bringing the combined investment of all the money spent to date and pledged to $4.8 million.

The completed feasibility study will decide whether to proceed with development of a storage dam on the Makaroro River that would provide for up to 22,000ha of irrigation in Central Hawkes Bay while also improving water quality and summer flows in the Tukituki River and its tributaries.

This is an important milestone for the fund with other schemes in Canterbury and around the country similarly poised to take advantage of this opportunity.

and driven to improve practices and knowledge.

Innovation is a key plank to achieve this.

If Stephen Fry was to do a top 10 gadgets for irrigation what would they be, and could you add to them. Will it be the impact arm on a sprinkler or the centrifugal pump, or that simple modified shepherd’s crook used to hook the sprinkler that would top the list.

In 2010 the biennial Innovation in Irrigation award went to the precision irrigation programme designed to increase the water use efficiency of existing centre pivot or lateral irrigators. This was an innovative use of computer programming and electrical wizardry. The monetary savings and efficiency gains have been quite significant for the early adopters that have installed this technology.

However some of the back yard, or should that be back paddock, inventions or gadgets that simply make your life easier can add as much value as the electronic wizardry.

Innovation does not necessarily have to be a gadget it could be a whole system or integration of many different Irrigation development investigation and implementation components. There are many opportunities that present is fraught with difficulty and uncertainties. The goal themselves when faced with a problem. posts continually shift with financial and environmental considerations moving and changing priorities. To be IrrigationNZ encourages you to bring out your inventions eligible for IAF support, projects must demonstrate high and ideas and measure them alongside other innovative standards of community consultation, strong commercial thoughts out there with an entry in the IrrigationNZ/ disciplines and a commitment to science and engineering Aqualinc Innovation in Irrigation awards. investigations that meet good industry practice.

Entries are now being accepted for the awards that carry Projects also need to demonstrate a commitment a cash prize of $2500 to be presented to the winner at the to requiring irrigators to achieve high standards of IrrigationNZ conference in Timaru. environmental performance and water use efficiency.

The irrigation industry is continually being challenged The IrrigationNZ conference opens on April 2 with a

Farmers Trade afternoon where over 60 exhibitors will be displaying the latest advances and ideas to improve irrigation practices and technology. This afternoon is aimed at the irrigators on the ground so will be of interest to all farmer irrigators, and the only time in New Zealand that you will find this many of the industry participants together under the one roof.

For conference delegates there is a choice of three bus trips taking in diverse areas of processing at McCains factory and Dominion Breweries in Washdyke, a bus tour of the Opuha lake, concluding with the significant developments of the Rangitata South development and Mayfield Hinds irrigation scheme, and a look at the industry leading environmental standards of the Waitaki with the Morven-Glenavy-Ikiwai scheme.

After taxing the grey matter and the shoe leather there will be an opportunity to “network” at the welcome function on Monday evening before two full days of conference proceedings on April 3 and 4.

For full conference details, programme and registration – visit www.irrigationnz.co.nz

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GUARDIAN FARMING

A time of awakening Sheryl Stivens

S

ustainability - what legacy do we leave behind?

Transformation can sometimes be drastic. The options for the way we deal with our resources and our rubbish has been transformed radically along with the types of things we throw away and what we buy.

The use of water resources is also undergoing a rapid transformation along with our land use practices.

In nature the ultimate example of transformation is metamorphosis. Our best example is the transformation of a caterpillar to a butterfly - an incredible transformation in appearance, functionality, organisation of components and purpose that transforms a strange looking voraciously hungry crawling caterpillar into a subtle gracious flying creature of profound beauty – a butterfly.

Biologists tell us that in the tissue of a caterpillar there are embedded cells that they call imaginal cells. They resonate at a different frequency. They are so unlike the other caterpillar cells, that the caterpillar’s immune system thinks they are enemies and tries to destroy them.

But the new imaginal cells continue to appear, more and more of them.

Eventually the caterpillar’s immune

system cannot destroy them fast enough and they become stronger, they connect and connect until they form a critical mass that realises their mission to bring about the amazing birth of a butterfly.

In 1968 Margaret Mead said: ”Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it’s the only thing that ever has.”

I firmly believe along with many others that there is an evolutionary effervescence within the tissues of society and farmers today. That in spite of the prevailing clamour of fear, greed, over consumption, pollution and destruction of our planet and violence expressed through society and vividly displayed on our television sets there is a coming together of the imaginal cells and visioning of a different world, a transformation, a metamorphosis a better way to live and farm.

Uruguayan poet, Mario Benedetti wrote: “What would happen if one day when we wake up we realise that we are the majority.” I say that the imaginal cells would rule and would make a butterfly world out of a caterpillar world.

This is the time of waking. Clusters of imaginal cells are gathering everywhere; they are beginning to recognise each

other; they are developing the tools for enhancing connectivity, sharing knowledge and skills to drive the next stage of our human society into manifestation, to bring about a new society that would compare to the present one as a butterfly with a caterpillar.

lives and farms sustainably? A society rooted in joy, mutual understanding and respect?

We can only imagine what this would look like. A new dimension of life, a compassionate and just society that values all resources and each other and

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You are all imaginal cells. Join others, congregate and let’s work together to develop a more sustainable way to farm and live.

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Page 15

Irrigation matters Tony Davoren, Hydroservices

U

sing last month’s opening comment – “the irrigation season that almost wasn’t continues”. And so it does.

Couldn’t help notice the influence of the easterly system we are being subjected to for the last, well nearly two weeks.

As I look out across what is left of Christchurch CBD this Tuesday evening amidst the thick drizzly easterly streaming in from Pegasus Bay, I think of those who want to harvest and those who don’t need to irrigate.

Travelling to and fro from central Otago last week I could not but notice the powerful influence the easterly weather system has on our weather: • Cool to cold; • Low thick cloud; and • Misty drizzle come light rain.

I took particular note of the temperatures and weather conditions as I drove my regular route to Tarras last Thursday.

While it was not particularly cold (15 odd °C), there was thick low cloud all the way to Burkes Pass. What contrast to two weeks previous when I was encouraged by the headers operating and the dust rising from barley and some ryegrass crops.

This time not a header to be seen in a paddock, except for those who left them in the vain hope there would be harvest weather the next, or the next or the next day so they could finish the paddock.

Anyway back to the easterly weather condition. As I drove “up” the plains, gradually rising at 1m every 200m so the temperature gradually dropped - 15°C at Rakaia, 13°C at

Geraldine and Fairlie and 10°C at the top of Burkes Pass.

Then within a few minutes (and a similar number of kilometres), blue sunny skies and 23°C. And so it was for the next 30 hours until I returned along the same route on Friday, realising before Tekapo the same greeted me after Burkes Pass – this time 11°C warming to 13°C all the way back home. Spectacular waterfalls of cloud spilling over Burkes Pass, Dobson skifield and mountain passes/low points was the only highlight. And still not a header to be seen moved from the previous day or any dust rising from the fields.

So much for the “tiki-tour” commentary. It might seem a little banal to discuss the weather I might have experienced. But this is just what arable farmers don’t need. Ryegrass sitting on the ground waiting to head, wheat waiting to head, drying almost impossible with 70 per cent humidity, BUT just great for irrigation demand.

Nothing like persistent and overcast NE weather to drive down the demand for irrigation. Water use declines, soil temperatures decline and the lack of sunshine has physiological effects on photosynthesis and crop quality.

For example: 1. Consider the plot of soil moisture. The slope of the water use (– –) in January is relatively steep – the weather was warmer, sunnier and resulted in higher water use. This slope is much steeper than the slope (– –) in late January and thus far in February. So, while we have similar day length and leaf area, the cooler and overcast weather of the north-easterly system has a significant effect on the

rate at which the crop uses water.

2. Secondly, consider the soil temperature plot. For much of January the “average” soil temperature was up around 19°C (– –), driven by sunnier and warmer weather. Once again the cooler and cloudier northeasterly weather since has lowered the “average by about 4°C. More noticeable is the maximum daytime soil temperature 25°C earlier in January compared to just 20°C in the last ten days.

Despite being in the “heat” of summer and the peak of incoming solar radiation, persistent cloudy and milder daytime temperatures have a significant effect on the demand for irrigation (less and longer between irrigations) and soil temperature. I wish for a return the early January weather patterns and the dust rising from harvesters.

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Attracting the right foreign ownership T

and quality food.

he media storm surrounding the recent Ministerial approval for the sale of the 16 Crafar Farms to a subsidiary of Shanghai Pengxin Group, and the ongoing opposition leading to a judicial review of the sale, has once more shown that for many New Zealanders, overseas ownership of our productive rural land remains an emotive issue.

Concerns raised over foreign land purchases include uncertainty around the plans owners have for the land, land becoming unaffordable and unavailable for New Zealanders, New Zealanders being “tenants in their own land” and wealth being sucked out of the country.

However, it does not represent a bargain purchase. The cost of pastoral land is comparatively expensive in New Zealand, distance to world markets is an issue and we have relatively high costs of production.

Alan Crafar on his farm.

We were not surprised when the results of our KPMG Agribusiness Agenda survey of 84 agricultural industry leaders in 2011 highlighted that foreign land ownership was one of their lowest priorities. Their greater concern was preventing overseas There have been a number of investors from bypassing the New Zealandtransactions in recent years, illustrated owned processing structures through locally here in Canterbury with the moving the value-added processing 18,125 hectare stable of Dairy Holdings farms currently being offered for sale by offshore (as has happened, for example, the South Canterbury Finance receivers, in the forestry sector) and ensuring that while it is understood that Synlait Farms land use is not altered to less productive are looking for an investor willing to take activities. a controlling stake in its 13 dairy farms.

However, changes to the Overseas Investment Act (OIA) in 2008, requiring There have also been many smaller the OIO to consider the economic benefits rural land sales (including vineyards) of any deal to New Zealand, provide mainly to European and American additional controls that would seem to investors that have been approved by address this risk. the Overseas Investment Office (OIO) and some high profile high-country So can the concerns of many New station sales in Mid Canterbury and the Zealanders be substantiated or are they Queenstown Lakes.

simply stoked by very public tender processes and rumour? Is there any evidence to suggest the country is in danger of being taken over? What benefits does foreign investment bring?

Firstly, there is no evidence to suggest a current peak in inbound investment in agribusiness. An analysis of approvals granted by the OIO/OIA to date indicates that approvals account for between only 1 per cent and 2 per cent of total available rural land in New Zealand.

Neither do we expect a wave of foreign rural land sales, primarily because there are far better investment alternatives. True, New Zealand has significant agricultural advantages - in particular, fresh water resources, a temperate climate and a ‘clean green’ brand - that on the surface makes our land attractive to overseas buyers looking for a source of safe, sustainable

Secondly, inbound investment is clearly not a new phenomenon. New Zealand, as a small and isolated country with a restricted capital base, has always relied on capital investment for development and has welcomed foreign investment as a way of supporting economic growth.

Many of our ‘crown jewel’ companies - for example, Fletcher Building, Telecom, Fisher and Paykel Appliances and Contact Energy – rely on significant foreign institutional or cornerstone investors.

It goes without saying that inbound investment over the decades has benefited the New Zealand economy and supported the standards of living we have become accustomed to. Traditionally this investment has flowed from our historical allies - Britain, Europe, the USA and Australia.

However, more recently, investment capital from these countries has substantially dried up and our Asian neighbours are now the ones with the cash available to support their global investment strategies.

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GUARDIAN FARMING

Page 17

KPMG Agribusiness commentators Ian Proudfoot and Scott McCutcheon examine the issues behind overseas ownership of rural land

While there’s no reason we shouldn’t be welcoming Asian investment with open arms, there certainly needs to be ‘win-win’ outcomes for both the investor and the investee. The potential benefits include technology transfer, research and development collaboration and improved access to foreign markets.

The OIO approval of the Shanghai Pengxin bid is based on the company making a significant investment to upgrade the Crafar Farms (under New Zealand ownership there had been numerous prosecutions for effluent and animal welfare issues related to these farms), and a requirement to develop a training facility for dairy farm workers.

The experience of one local Canterbury company also demonstrates the positive impacts such inbound investment can have. Synlait Milk’s relationship with Bright Dairy Company has enabled the company to expand its milk processing plant capacity and has secured market access into China through Bright Dairy’s distribution network.

This has a positive flow-on for the Canterbury economy, with numerous local suppliers being engaged to provide goods and services for the expansion and an increase in the local workforce.

However, the price overseas investors are prepared to pay for land can be

a deterrent to attracting young New Zealanders onto the land and investing in agribusiness.

In the 2011 KPMG Agribusiness Agenda, we suggest that well-capitalised offshore investors have the ability to assist in addressing on-farm productivity issues and can support young farmers on to the land.

Co-investment schemes, where foreign investors link with ambitious young farmers, can provide an opportunity for the next generation of farmers to gain a foothold on the land ownership ladder while both partners receive tax and other benefits.

These should be encouraged as a model for inbound investment.

A key challenge for New Zealand’s agribusiness sector is to retain its leadership position in the global industry by ensuring it has a full pipeline of on-farm innovation and sufficient capital to invest in implementing these quickly, so they deliver value to the farmgate.

We believe that the right foreign coinvestment in New Zealand agribusiness - investment that results in ‘win-win’ outcomes rather than adversely affecting New Zealanders - does indeed contribute positively to the economy through market access, technical support and innovation.

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3

PHOTO JOHNNY HOUSTON 221111-JH-001

The Synlait-Bright Dairy Company partnership is a good example of how overseas investment can have postive spin-offs.

The Authors: Ian Proudfoot is Head of Agribusiness, KPMG New Zealand and Asia Pacific Scott McCutcheon is Senior Manager, Agribusiness KPMG Christchurch.

Full range of engineering supplies & accessories for all your repairs and maintenance Kerrick Hot & Cold Waterblasters & Industrial Vacuum Cleaners Esseti Welders & Accessories Stockists and distributors of Trailer Equipment Blacklows TradeZone Ashburton Locally owned & operated family business with over 59 years experience.

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Page 18

GUARDIAN FARMING

What causes earthquakes?

S

ince the earth was created 4.5 billion years ago it has implemented a natural climate and a stable planetary rhythm. Cycles include day and night, seasons and weather events during the particular season, short-term climate fluctuations and oscillations within seasons, and long-term climate change cycles such as glacial periods approximately every 100,000 years. There are also rhythms on the inside.

In response to cosmic influences, about 2600 earthquakes a day occur around the world. New Zealand averages 15,000 per year, and since September 2010 we have had 35,000, with a third of them in Canterbury.

Since most earthquakes are minor only a fraction reach the news. The first mistake is to think of them as something unusual. Just like the daily ocean surge we call the tide, earthquakes are vertical tides of pressure-release that begin as far down as 400kms.

Every day of every year the land tide makes New Zealand rise about 200mm towards the transiting moon and then recede again as the moon sets.

Monitored by and following the land tide, the sea tide sloshes into gaps created by daily expanding bays and harbours. When the moon is closer to earth (perigee), the land tide is higher. On September 4, 2010 the moon was the second closest to earth for the year, causing a land kingtide. It was also equinox month.

Just above Earth’s surface is the atmosphere, moving fluidly around the planet. It is one of three movable oceans - air, water, and land, subject to tidal

fluctuation due to oscillations in gravitation. Beneath the atmosphere is the bulk of the planet called the land, consisting of 32 per cent iron.

The first layer of land is the thin crust, only 5 to 75 kilometres deep and containing oceans and fresh water lakes. Beneath the crust is the largest layer, the mantle, descending to a depth of about 2900kms, and comprising mostly silicate rocks rich in magnesium and iron.

Beneath the mantle is the outer core, mostly liquid iron. Finally in the centre of the earth is the solid iron inner core, about 80 per cent the size of the moon, and which is electrically charged.

Imagine a giant horseshoe magnet clipping snugly around a big sphere - the earth, such that the N of the magnet is over the North Pole and the S of the other end of the horseshoe is over the South Pole.

That causes an electromagnetic field around the magnet and also, the sphere. Take away the sphere and the electromagnetic field is still there between the magnets.

Now imagine a moveable section of iron-ore positioned somewhere between the poles, embedded in geological material of lesser magnetisation.

Introduce an electrical current with imaginary wires to the poles. The area of iron would move forward with respect to its surrounding substrata, something an electrical engineer would call a solenoid.

Now replace that sphere and call it planet earth, with areas of ore in the interior that respond to electrical stimulation. When an outside current is introduced, e.g. solar flares, parts within the earth act as a solenoid, trying to move perpendicular to the poles

and emerging to surface until the electrical potential difference dissipates.

Add that in a year of a more active sun, such as the last third of 2010, the solenoid effect increases. A simple solenoid is hard to restrain, so the force of an earth-solenoid effect is unstoppable. Instead of a simple relay switch with a movable rod, the earthly equivalent is several miles wide, moving at 22,000 mph with the force of 43 Hiroshima bombs, pushing through surrounding rock.

It easily pushes aside tectonic plates at the surface, emerging at their junction, being the quickest way to the surface through lesser density. The scar it leaves on the landscape would get to be called a fault line.

The fault-line and the “rubbing together of the plates” are not the cause. Sometimes as this earth plug emerges it brings earth to the surface forming hills, volcanoes, and eventually possibly a whole mountain chain. Eventually the results of the event are called an island or a country.

That some may not concur with this theory is understandable. The astronomer notices only electromagnetism coming from the sun and assumes it reaches earth, but cares little for what becomes of it because his focus is skywards. An electrical engineer knows the solenoid scenario, but before-and-after effects are of lesser consideration. The seismologist’s training begins where tectonic plates begin moving.

None of the aforementioned think cycles have much to contribute, and astronomers, although aware of them, have greater interest in what is coming and going, rather than how often. Cycles mean nothing to

Sustainable Solutions for Today’s Agricultural Challenges ANIMAL AND PLANT NUTRITION PROBLEMS? Plant diseases, plant nutrition problems, (effecting nodulation, proteins and photosynthesis), weeds and pests. Animal health problems (sleepy sickness, milk fever, high somatic cell counts). These are indications of soil nutrient problems, such as excesses or deficiencies.

It doesn’t have to be that way – we are able to provide a proposed solution.

There is a direct relationship between the minerals in the soil and the health of plants and animals. Just applying some nutrients to the soil doesn’t guarantee the plant can access them.

You need to measure and supply the correct chemistry for each particular soil.

YOU NEED A PLAN AND A PROGRAMME!

Let us take a comprehensive soil test – including trace minerals.

We will analyse it, provide interpretation and give a recommendation.

We can organise, supply and mix fertilisers and nutrients that are required.

HEALTHY SOILS Soil Fertility Farming PROGRAMME, is focused on progressively building and maintaining soil fertility for optimum quality and yield.

Balancing soil minerals aids in getting the essential nutrients into the plant to maximise production from the soil, or to solve nutritional problems.

We also have a PLAN for improving the biology.

Feed the soil and let the soil feed the plant. This is what the Albrecht system of soil fertility emphasizes, which uses soil chemistry to affect soil physics.

This determines the environment for the biology of the soil.

Healthy Soils Healthy Soils Biological Farming Consultant Donald Hart 0274320187 and Sally Truelove 0274362458

GUARDIAN FARMING

Page 19

Ken Ring the electrician, and the seismologist examines fault-lines at specific locations, rather than for the whole globe.

On 22 February 2011 a flurry of solar activity was unleashed from the sun and headed towards earth. It was perigee full moon three days prior, gravitationally stressing earth’s inner core, setting up potential for internal movement.

Solar activity and an interplanetary alignment stressed the electromagnetic field around earth, such that flashes were seen in the sky and weird clouds.

A large section of earth/ore 12kms beneath the surface began to move upwards and through the Christchurch CBD. Solar physicists said the sun caused it. Electrical engineers know moving rocks give off a current that can cause flashes on the horizon. The air was statically charged and animals complained because they felt itchy.

Higher pressure gave birds headaches and they fell silent. Geologists saw that tectonic plates moved and blamed that. Seismologists said it was expected anytime in the next 18,000 years.

And Christchurch residents did not sit around pondering the matter, and many vacated the area.

It is the beauty of the internet that we now know that on the day a 6.3mag earthquake shook Christchurch, an almighty volcano went up in Shiveluch, Central Kamchatka, Russia, throwing giant rocks 6kms into the air. That day too, Mt Kilauea erupted in Hawaii. On 21-22 February, pilots reported that ash plumes rose to altitudes of 2.4 to 2.7 km from Sakura-Jima one of Japan’s most active volcanoes.

Just three days before, on the 18th, Tengger Caldera on Eastern Java (Indonesia) blew its stack, as did Mt Planchon-Peteroa on the Central Chile-Argentina border. Mt Stromboli, Aeolian Islands (Italy), erupted 17-23 February. And also on 22 February, in Santa Maria, Guatemala, incandescent avalanches originated from the top of Caliente dome, there was a 6.2mag earthquake near the east coast of Kamchatka, Russia; also Volcano Islands, Japan, received a 5.7mag jolt, Baja in California received a 5.0mag

shake, and a 5.8mag event occurred in Santiago Del Estero, Argentina.

Also, there were numerous smaller unreported events.

It wasn’t gigantic coincidence, it wasn’t just Christchurch and it wasn’t a mysterious one-off. The earth was being charged as one body and the inner core responded, creating strain and stress release around the globe, in response to a cosmic cycle fluctuation.

Earthquakes eventually lessen in an affected location as the positioning of the earth-solenoid effect moves on.

Overall earthquakes have diminished in numbers in Christchurch by 70 per cent since April 2011, but it is typically a 2-3 year timeline.

An affected region can start planning its rebuild for when this timeline lapses.

Summary, outlook period Approximately 7

Number of rain days:

March 1st-3rd, 11th, 14th, 17th, 28th-29th

Precipitation potential times:

March 5th-9th, 20th-22nd

Mostly dry Wettest periods:

March 1st-3rd, 28th-29th

Warmest maximum temperatures:

March 7th-10th

Coolest maximum temperatures:

March 13th-15th

Warmest minimums:

March 1st-2nd, 11th

Coldest minimums:

March 18th, 31st

Sunniest days:

March 9th-10th

Best days for outdoor recreation:

March 5th-9th March 19th-22nd, 24th-29th

Cloudiest: Estimated precipation for Ashburton:

165mm

Rakaia:

174mm

Methven:

124mm

Estimated sunshine amount for Ashburton:

144 hrs (March average 160hrs)

General A wetter than average month, with some summer temperatures persisting over the first 10 days, after which autumn coolness sets quickly in. The month may not go four days without somewhere seeing some rain in the district. Temperatures should be average with maxima 19-20°C and for minima around 10°C. Windier days may be around 6th-11th, 15th-16th and 29th.

Higher king-tides are expected around 12th and 24th. The 2nd and 31st are neap tide days, which are favoured for harvesting crops.

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Page 20

GUARDIAN FARMING

A good harvest Kerry Maw

A

t this time of year farmers are in full swing with their harvest – weather permitting. The harvesters, balers, trucks and tractors can readily be seen in the paddocks and traffic has taken on a distinctly agricultural flavour.

If you’re not in the garden, you’re probably flat out in the kitchen preserving and freezing your surplus bounty. If you’re like me you have a few stock standard recipes, but occasionally you want to try something a little different.

But while life on the farm is pretty hectic, things are no less busy in the country’s vege gardens. Gardeners will be busy picking the fruits of their crops, hopefully before the birds get them.

Well, hard on the heels of our last hugely successful cookbook, Rural Women New Zealand has now produced a fabulous new book, titled A Good Harvest. It is filled with pages of practical, easy to use and dependable recipes which have been tried and tested over the years in the kitchens of New Zealand’s rural women.

There’s chutneys, jams, pickles, marinades, pie fillings, sauces, cakes and biscuits.

Many old favourites, and some a little different for the more adventurous. And if you’ve never preserved fruits and vegetables before there are wonderful photographs and really easy step-by-step instructions.

With some lovely photos of rural life, great recipes, tips and pointers, this book is a wonderful companion to our earlier cookbook A Good Spread. There’s even a few gardening tips thrown in for good measure to ensure your garden continues to be a top producer.

A Good Harvest goes on sale in bookshops on March 2 although you are able to preorder your copy from the Rural Women New Zealand national office website:

www.ruralwomen.org.nz Reaping what you sow Talking of great harvests, it’s always a great feeling when you can reap what you sow.

And that doesn’t only apply to gardening.

It’s even true in business. When you put in the effort and your business grows, you can reap the rewards. And there’s nothing better than having that effort recognised.

Rural Women New Zealand continues to recognise the amazingly innovative women working in our rural communities.

For women running small rural businesses, the RWNZ Enterprising Rural Women Award is the perfect promotional opportunity to kick-start the year.

The event has now been running for four years and has successfully uncovered some exciting businesses run by women in rural areas. The wide variety of businesses has seen past winners include an animal homeopathy business, a farm walk and homestay enterprise, a forestry trucking company, a children’s merino sock producer, and a traditional-style cheese maker.

This year there are three award categories – the Telecom North Island Award, the Access Homehealth South Island Award, and a new category, the Fly Buys Online Business Award, recognising the growth of internet-based businesses. Each category winner will receive $1000 in prize money.

The supreme winner of the RWNZ Enterprising Rural Women Award 2012 will be chosen from the three category winners, and will receive a further $1000 as well as a trophy.

Last year’s supreme winner, cheese maker extraordinaire Lisa Harper of Sherrington Grange Limited, says her win has brought extensive media attention. As well as the welcome publicity boost, she says winning the supreme award affirmed her business decisions, whilst working in the relative isolation of the outer Marlborough Sounds.

The RWNZ Enterprising Rural Women Awards 2012 are open to small businesses with 10 staff or less, that have been operating for at least two years. Women must be an active partner of 50 per cent or more. Entry forms and further information can be found on the Rural Women New Zealand website www.ruralwomen.org.nz.

New Zealand’s rural women are incredible people. Wherever they work, whether it is on the farm, in the home, volunteering, or in business they make outstanding contributions. Their achievements may be a wonderfully full larder of preserves and bursting freezers, or growing and succeeding in the business world. All are working for the nourishment and enrichment of life, family, and community.

All are reaping what they sow, creating and enjoying A Good Harvest.

It’s down to the wire – and you’re about to make a choice When deciding on what brand to choose it’s a good idea to talk to farmers who have made the choice already. Our technology and experience is proven in your region and from planning to completion you’ll quickly realise that...

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