30,287 copies distributed monthly – to every rural mailbox in Canterbury and the West Coast
January 2020 Edition
INSIDE Boots and all THIS EDITION Lincoln Uni rebuild
p3 Farm machinery
p13 Soil matters
p28 Summer envy
Prime Minster Jacinda arden was on hand to lend her support to a tree planting programme which was one of two sustainable projects she helped to launch at the Canterbury dairy company Synlait’s Dunsandel factory. In addition to helping with the launch of Whakapuawai, a Synlait initiative which will provide four million native trees for farmers to plant over the next eight years, she also opened the company’s first electrode boiler which will help Synlait reduce its dependency on coal. For more on her visit and the Whakapuawai programme see Page 25.
MPI crack down on raw drinking milk suppliers
The Ministry for Primary Industries has directed unregistered raw (unpasteurised) drinking milk suppliers across the country to stop selling their product until they comply with the legal requirements for sale.
❚ by Kent Caddick p31
In December Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) compliance staff executed search warrants at non-compliant raw drinking milk suppliers in Auckland, Hawkes Bay, Manawatu, Horowhenua, Nelson and Southland following a year-long operation.
MPI’s Manager of Food Compliance Melinda Sando said the purpose of the co-ordinated site visits was to gather evidence of the offending and to allow further investigation of non-compliant sales. “We believe that the suppliers we visited were operating outside of the regulatory framework.
“By not adhering to the rules for selling raw drinking milk, they are putting consumer health at risk. “There have been multiple instances in the past of people getting sick after drinking raw milk from some of these suppliers. We can’t let this continue.”
TO PAGE 2