EFFLUENT
Thinking outside the box By Cheyenne Nicholson
A system used in Africa for water has provided a Southland farmer with the perfect solution for the farm effluent system.
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aving an effluent application setup that breaks down, is difficult to move and frequently costs money to repair can quickly leave you up an effluent creek without a paddle. This was the situation Southland farmer Edwin Mabonga found himself in 10 years ago. Today, he has what he deems “the perfect setup” that saves him time and money. The investment has paid for itself many times over, he says, and best of all, his staff are happier shifting the irrigator as it’s not a big burden on them. Edwin, his wife Fungai and their two children emigrated to New Zealand 18 years ago, with their third child being born here. The Mabongas are sharemilking for an equity partnership of which they are partners. The 270-hectare farm borders the Aparima River in western Southland. The farm comprises 200ha owned by the partnership, with a further 70ha lease and an 85ha runoff for young stock, and milks around 850 Kiwicross cows. While NZ might be chalk and cheese with Zimbabwe, where Edwin hails from, it’s his experience with irrigation there that helped him form the solution for his effluent application problems here. “Ten years ago when I first came to this farm, we were running into a lot of issues with effluent application. We had K-Lines for effluent application, and every time you shifted them something broke, the hose would get a kink or something else would go wrong. They were a right pain, and it got to the point where the staff weren’t happy moving them,” he recalls. Wanting to decrease the repair bills, make life easier on staff and find a more efficient solution for effluent application, Edwin put his thinking cap on. A hard hose coil irrigator ticked all the boxes for him. The system has a 50m radius
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Edwin Mabonga works on a farm in Southland, which is vastly different from Zimbabwe, but his experience there has helped find solutions for effluent application.
cover and 300-metre of hose, which allows effluent to be spread over a large area, can be used for water and effluent irrigation and is simple and easy to move – and it works every time you go to shift it. “Having lived in Zimbabwe, I’ve worked a lot with irrigation. I used this system for water in Zimbabwe so I thought, ‘yep, this should work as a solution for effluent spreading too,’ so I made some enquiries,” he says. While the idea was great in theory, there were a few hurdles to overcome. Firstly, the company selling the hard hose coil irrigator weren’t all that keen on
selling it for the use of effluent spreading at the time. Secondly, the shareholders of the farm weren’t keen on investing the money required for a new system. Throw in the low application rate of their council consent for effluent and it started as an unlikely option. “The shareholders weren’t keen to spend money on another system. I managed to convince them that this idea had merit and better suited our values of good environmental management. They have been happy with the decision and their $26,000 investment,” he says. While the initial upfront cost of the new system is large, Mabonga says it’s
DAIRY FARMER
February 2021
