35 minute read
Top RWNZ
Land Champions Top RWNZ award for shearer
A competitive and world record-holding shearer, Sarah Higgins’ passion for shearing has earned her a top award at the NZI Rural Women NZ 2020 Business Awards. She talked with Annette Scott.
SARAH Higgins’ Marlboroughbased shearing business breaks all the stereotypes of how a shearing crew might look and behave.
“We strive to break through the status quo of the shearing industry,” Higgins said.
And, it was her passion and commitment to harness her love of the land that has her Higgins Shearing business now firmly rooted in its local community.
Running a mixed-gender team, Higgins works hands-on in the sheds day-to-day and when not on the shearing board, she assists in organising and sponsoring local shearing events and professional development for shearers and wool handlers.
It was a combination of her commitment, outstanding leadership for the industry and support for the rural community that stood out to the judges when she was named the Supreme Award winner in the NZI Rural Women New Zealand (RWNZ) 2020 Business Awards.
A win that was not expected.
“It’s still sinking in. Some of the other category winners I follow are really successful people as well, and to even be compared with them is humbling.”
Higgins says when encouraged to enter the awards she thought it would be a good opportunity to benchmark her company and get a good external overview of her business.
“I never expected this, it is pretty exciting, a huge accolade to win,” she said.
Higgins grew up on a sheep farm in Havelock North and from her childhood days loved sheep, wool and rural life.
The now 28-year-old went on to spend three years studying agriculture, majoring in marketing, at Lincoln University.
It was never a plan to become a shearer, let alone run her own shearing business.
But after completing her BCom-Ag she went travelling for two years, all of which she spent woolhandling as she made her way around the UK, Germany, Australia and back home in NZ.
“I was going to use my degree very differently, like in marketing in the wool industry,” she said.
“It just happened; by the time the two years were up, I had well and truly done my time woolhandling.
“But I always said ‘I would love to learn to shear; how cool would it be to shear just one sheep?’”
Shear one sheep Higgins did, and that one sheep had a significant bearing on her career path.
“When I left school, having worked as a wool handler in the shed, I developed a real passion for wool and wanted to head in the direction of marketing,” she said.
“But six months in an office role soon sorted that for me and I couldn’t get shearing out my system.”
Her inspiration came from her passion for the job.
“People were encouraging. It was amazing the support I got to shear more sheep, and then someone overheard my whisper about starting a business back home and the encouragement for that was incredibly inspiring,” she said.
So, the planning began.
“My partner at the time and I were going to start up a shearing business, but that fell apart, so I decided to do it by myself,” she said.
COMMUNITY: Since shearing full-time, Sarah Higgins says she loves to see others excel in what is essentially a professional sport.
Five years on Higgins, and Higgins Shearing, have branded real success in the industry.
With her mixed-gender team of eight, Higgins is full-time on the job, with her team predominantly shearing for the locals in the Marlborough region.
I enjoy the day-to-day running of the business, but I love working in the shed and shearing.
“Farmers love our passion for the work we do and the commitment we put in to doing the best we can for their wool in such a professional manner,” she said.
“Since shearing full-time, it is now my number one passion and I love to see others excel in what is essentially a professional sport.”
Higgins mentors and supports
Sarah Higgins
upcoming women shearers, while making an outstanding contribution to the wool industry and shearing community.
As a competitive and world record-holding shearer herself, Higgins encourages her team to develop their skills by participating in shearing and woolhandling competitions.
On the competitive side of her shearing, Higgins currently holds the nine-hour, four-stand lamb shearing world record, set in January 2020.
“I was elbowed to give it a go; it’s been a great achievement but when I look back it was quite a selfish thing to do,” she said.
“I was so focused on myself and training, I had to leave others to run my business for a bit.
“I am so lucky to have people around me who have given me such support in all my shearing, both as a business and a sport.
“It (the record) was such a massive thing to do, I’m not sure I’ll do it again – we’ll see.”
Meantime, Higgins is confident the wool industry will pick up.
“I feel like the pieces of the puzzle are there for a resurgence, but it just needs some sort of messaging and branding to get it together, and industry will need to work together on that,” she said.
The shearer shortage has not presented any issues for her business.
“We’ve been okay, I’ve managed to build up a team of locals and we stick together,” she said.
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Land Champions Conduit for growers, researchers
Late last month Kiwifruit Vine Health liaison adviser and technical specialist Linda Peacock received the Minister’s Award at the New Zealand Biosecurity Awards, recognising more than 30 years of dedicated service to the industry. Colin Williscroft reports.
WHEN Linda Peacock received her award from Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor she told the Wellington audience that a key part of her work involves providing a link between growers and researchers to ensure the collaboration the industry is renowned for continues.
“I talk to people,” Peacock said.
“I help people on the land understand what some of the big words mean and I tell scientists what those people want and have to know, so they can do what they do. It’s all about linkages and collaboration.”
Not only does she provide technical and leadership support and help develop kiwifruit biosecurity research initiatives, Peacock is integral to the next steps of those research projects – interpreting outcomes and converting them into practical messages for growers and others in the industry.
Over the years she has held a wide variety of roles in the industry, from picking fruit on a family orchard as a teenager to 10 years as technical manager at Direct Management Services (DMS) Progrowers, a Bay of Plenty kiwifruit and avocado orchard management and post-harvest operation.
From there she joined Kiwifruit Vine Health, a biosecurity organisation that supports the kiwifruit industry in its recovery from Psa – a bacteria that can lead to the death of kiwifruit vines –
FOCUSED: Linda Peacock tagging kiwifruit vines as part of monitoring in Nelson last month. Photo: Supplied
and ensuring future resilience from similar threats.
Peacock’s experience has not only helped develop industry-wide knowledge, it’s been essential in building trust, an essential element in her current role.
She is a dedicated liaison and technical support specialist at the centre of growers, post-harvest organisations, contractors, merchants, researchers, technical advisors, interest groups, regional councils and others working towards biosecurity knowledge and best practice management of Psa.
In a nutshell, being a conduit between growers and researchers.
Peacock says the kiwifruit industry has a strong history of being well supported by science, as growers appreciate how important it is.
For that relationship to work effectively, it is important to be clear from the outset what the purpose of research is and what value it will provide.
She says the industry works on an 80:20 rule. That is, if research is going to be undertaken there needs to be an 80% chance that it will result in something practical that growers can work with.
That’s why growers are included in steering groups that help determine the direction of research.
“Having them (growers) involved from the beginning helps to sort out the wheat from the chaff,” she said.
Another aspect of her job is managing KiwiNet, the industry’s network of about 100 biosecurity champions who look to foster and share knowledge about biosecurity.
Those involved also coordinate the deployment of resources into biosecurity responses, such as during the Auckland fruit fly outbreak in 2019 where 41 people contributed almost 700 “people days” into response operations.
Peacock says the network was born out of a post-Psa review that found the industry was not focused enough on biosecurity and despite NZ’s relative isolation in an ocean at the bottom of the world, there were still exposure risks.
Building on lessons learned from the Psa experience and work already done in this area by the forestry industry, which was further down the track in developing biosecurity preparedness plans, KiwiNet members began by looking at what potential pests and diseases that could be threats to the kiwifruit industry, what sort of impacts they could have and what could be put in place on a daily basis to deal with different scenarios if the industry found itself in that position.
Workshops are held twice a year so attendees can continue to build their knowledge, share ideas and expertise, and lift biosecurity expectations.
There are also podcasts and articles that go into industry journals and newsletters. It’s all about sharing information.
While a lot has changed since Psa arrived, Peacock says it is important to remember the lessons learned from the experience and not to allow complacency to creep in following the industry’s success so far in dealing with it.
As part of that, she is keen to push ahead with the new Pathway Management Plan, which has been consulted on across the kiwifruit during the past year.
She says after the Psa incursion the industry responded with a regulatory plan to deal with it. However, that plan only has a 10-year lifespan, which expires in 2023 and is solely focused on Psa.
“The industry now has an opportunity to move forward and improve on what it knows by retaining the benefits of the current plan across the industry, but (also to) broaden its focus to include a wider range of pests,” she said.
As kiwifruit growing expands and moves into new geographic areas containing other crops there will be a new set of challenges and the industry needs to be prepared for them.
The Pathway Management Plan aims to help by establishing a new set of rules while also developing new tools and resources to help growers protect their investments.
It’s hoped that after submitting the proposed plan to O’Connor, and going through the parliamentary process, it will be implemented as part of the Biosecurity Act by April 2022.
Peacock says once that is in place the kiwifruit industry will be better placed to meet whatever future biosecurity challenges arrive.
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texting 5626.
A new lease on life
Torrid life experiences proved to be Lindsay Wright’s apprenticeship for work with the Rural Support Trust in Southland. Neal Wallace talks to the former Wendonside farmer about the scratches and bruises that life has served up to him.
LINDSAY Wright agonised for months about what to do with his fourth-generation family farm.
The uncertainty was adding to his depression but in the end, the decision only took a few minutes to make once he started working with a counsellor to address his health issues.
She asked him three questions: Did he want to stay as he was? Did he want to sell it? Did he want to employ a manager?
The answer to all of those was no, leaving him with one option – leasing it out.
“It literally took minutes to make a life-changing decision to lease the farm, but the weight coming off my shoulders that instant was unbelievable because suddenly I had a plan and a direction,” Wright said.
The scratches and bruises acquired as he battled mental health issues were part of what Wright called a 55-year apprenticeship to prepare him for a career with the Southland Rural Support Trust.
His illness gave him an affinity for the mental and emotional struggles many rural people face.
Months before the decision to lease out his farm, Wright recalls the exact time and place that he realised he could no longer cope with his mental health issues alone.
It was spring 2005 and he was on a lambing beat on his farm near Waikaia and had just driven through a gate.
“I drove another 20m and stopped, I realised I couldn’t do this anymore,” he said.
“Something had to change, but I wasn’t sure what.”
He could not battle his demons alone.
For weeks he had sat in front of his computer trying unsuccessfully to balance his budget to account for a sharp correction in new season lamb prices.
Prime lambs, which had been worth $100 the previous season, were forecast to be worth $80, but Wright had geared his farm to function at the higher figure, having invested in a badly needed upgrade of machinery and equipment.
“My expenses going out were not matching my income and I didn’t know what to do,” he said.
Wright initially worked as a computer programmer in Sydney before returning home to the farm in 1982, in time to face the 1984 economic reforms known as Rogernomics.
Farming on his own at the time, Wright survived by paring back all costs and doing work himself.
“The first piece of mail I got when farming under my own name was an account from Southland Frozen Meat for the pool for the previous season,” he said.
The lamb pools had lost money that year and the meat company sought reimbursement.
Fast-forward a decade and financial commitments built up over the previous years meant Wright could not repeat the hunkering down tactic.
The worry and anguish of being unable to balance his budget pushed him into a dark hole.
“The one thing I didn’t do is ask anyone for help,” he said.
“I never put together a management team, so I was carrying the load on my own – especially at 2am each night.
“It was the good times that put me under, not the bad times.”
Lindsay Wright
For months he agonised over his financial problems, an ever present heavyweight in his stomach a constant reminder.
He realised later that he had slipped into depression, something that cost him his marriage.
Equally he was in denial.
“When I was greeted by someone who would ask ‘how are you?’ I would lie by responding ‘I’m good.’ But I was not good at all,” he said.
“I later changed to saying I was battling, and that wasn’t a lie.”
In reality, he had hit a wall.
Realising on that spring day that he was not coping, Wright called a counsellor in Gore and was fortunate to get an appointment the next day.
“I parked 200m away and walked to the counsellor’s office and made sure no one was around before I snuck in,” he said.
It was a cathartic experience.
“I broke down and howled for 40 minutes,” he said.
“The counsellor said, ‘I do not have any answers, but you do and we’re going to find them.’
“That was the beginning. From then on, I would have told the milk boy my story.
“That point of spilling my guts on the floor was a release valve. I let it go and it put me in a position to talk about that stuff.”
He began parking outside the counsellor’s front door and striding inside, relieved he was finally addressing his issues.
He likened his weekly visits to filling his petrol tank.
Wright also had the support of four friends he would call regularly and who would listen.
Six months after confronting his issues, a voice in his head told him it was time to move on, which he did by ceasing to reflect on his problems but instead focus on his future.
“I’d stepped through the door from looking backward to looking forward,” he said.
That included deciding the future of his Wendonside sheep and beef farm.
In March 2006 it was leased to a neighbour.
Wright took time out to travel, tackle his bucket list, unwinding and recharging.
Back home in 2007, he saw an advertisement for the establishment of the Southland Rural Support Trust.
“I saw it and wondered if I was of any use or a lead weight,” he said.
“I didn’t know what they wanted, so rang them up and said, ‘here is my history’.”
His experiences and the associated scratches and bruises were indeed useful to a group charged with helping rural people in need.
In 2010 he was elected chair of the trust and two days later a severe snowstorm struck Southland and Otago, demolishing the roof of Stadium Southland in Invercargill and wreaking havoc among farmers.
“That was where the Southland Rural Support Trust cut its teeth,” he said.
It gained credibility and began a working relationship with Civil Defence, which has remained strong ever since.
A further cathartic experience stemmed from a desire to determine his identity.
Wright was no longer a computer programmer or a farmer, leaving an unfilled space that irritated him.
He enrolled at Otago Polytechnic for a Bachelor of Applied Management degree, which was basically an assessment of prior learning based on what he had learnt through life.
Wright’s study focused on his time farming and it revealed he had been successful.
When he started farming, he ran 4500 ewes, clipping 2.5kg of wool and lambing 95% with lambs sold for processing averaging 13kg.
When he left, he was running 3700 ewes, clipping 5.5kg of wool, lambing 145% and lambs killing out at 18kg. He was selling more than 20 tonnes of extra meat a year.
“I suddenly realised I had achieved all I set out to do but had not seen it,” he said.
“Rather than focus on what I had done, I had been focusing on what I couldn’t do.”
Wright says everyone deals with stress differently, but his story is not unusual for farmers who have the added factor of isolation and working on their own.
When they cannot cope, they struggle to make decisions
SHARING IS CARING: Southland Rural Support Trust member Lindsay Wright uses his life experience to help others.
and animal welfare and the environment problems are symptoms of that decisionmaking paralysis.
Wright remains heavily involved in the Rural Support Trust, helping rural people deal with challenges such as weather events, or those mentally struggling to cope.
During the 2010 snowstorm, 2000 farmers were visited to check their wellbeing and in the Southland floods earlier this year, 1100 were contacted.
He has helped promote the Good Yarn workshops, which teaches people how to recognise mental health signs and help those who are struggling.
It is in a farmer’s nature to tolerate adversity and confront it through hard physical toil hoping it will come right.
But Wright has learnt first-hand that is not a viable strategy, but one that can backfire, affecting relationships with family or loved ones.
He considers it a privilege to be part of the Rural Support Trust network and to help others in the rural community.
“I have a lifelong affinity for the rural sector and I have bounced through and got some bumps along the way, but to be able to help somebody going through some pain is very rewarding,” he said.
MORE:
Suffering from depression or stress, or know someone who is? Where to get help: RURAL SUPPORT TRUST: 0800 RURAL HELP DEPRESSION HELPLINE: 0800 111 757 LIFELINE: 0800 543 354 NEED TO TALK? Call or text 1737 SAMARITANS: 0800 726 666 YOUTHLINE: 0800 376 633 or text 234
Flood master steps down
A drive across the Hauraki Plains on a sunny, late-spring day belies the challenges keeping the region’s thousands of hectares habitable and productive. The 1150 square kilometres of rural tabletop sits at sea level, with only a complex drainage system keeping the sea and rainfall from wreaking havoc. Richard Rennie reports.
NGATEA farmer Robert Hicks has spent decades tending the spider web of flood protection on the plains that captures, tames and flushes away floodwaters.
He has just stepped down following 40-plus years on various iterations of drainage committees at a district and regional council level on the Piako-Waihou flood protection scheme.
Time spent with Hicks reveals a farmer with a strong sense of community, and an appreciation for what that means when trying to balance flood waters as they catastrophically spill across farms, districts and communities.
“I have always been interested in looking at how something could be fixed and improved,” he said.
“But with flood protection, it is not enough to just say ‘the water’s gone from my farm, so it’s all fine now’.
“You have to think about where it’s going, and what it’s going to do to the person next door, or down the road from you.”
Today that solution is a system that allows councils to perform a hydraulic juggling act when flood risks rise. Splitting the region into 1000ha grids, masses of water are artfully redirected, pumped and distributed, lowering the impact of floods on any one particular district on the plains.
Hicks came to be involved in the country’s largest managed flood protection scheme after it was established, but when much still needed to be done, particularly in the Piako district.
“It is a catchment that has almost every element of flood risk you could have in New Zealand,” he said.
“There is the high rainfall country of the Kaimai-Mamakus to the east and south, many fastflowing tributaries to the Piako and Waihou rivers, and low-lying land next to the coast.”
The catchment is almost as long as the Waikato region itself, stretching from the Firth of Thames to Mamaku, near Rotorua in the south.
The scheme’s 52 pumping stations, 139 floodgates and 360km of stopbanks mean it is the most intensively drained region in the country.
However, the mass of infrastructure required to keep floodwaters controlled and sea water back requires constant budgeting and maintenance.
It is something Hicks has quietly addressed as the system has aged, and infrastructure gradually required replacement or repair.
His commitment to the scheme has come not only from owning farmland in the middle of the district, but also from one of his earliest childhood memories.
“I remember going with my dad back in 1954, I was seven and we drove up to Netherton and the entire place was under water, just awash,” he said.
“Also, my grandfather came here in 1920 and he was on the local drainage board, at a time when the place was known to flood a lot.”
Until January 2018, the worst flood recorded on the plains had been in 1938, but protecting the region in earnest had begun in 1910 after the Hauraki Plains Act was passed.
“What impressed me was how well the Waihou-Piako catchment had been run over the years before I became chair. That was in part thanks to some of the staff who have also given 40 to 50 years to it,” he said.
Robert Hicks
He was, however, very conscious that three of every four dollars had been granted by the Government for the project, and the other dollar given as a long-term loan. This left farmers and landowners with a Rolls Royce scheme, but one that could prove hard to afford over time.
“So in the early years I got the job of allocating costs, based on benefit received, on new works projects. This started off small, say just on one drain project,” he said.
As far as he knows, it remains the only scheme of its type in NZ that is a total catchment benefitbased rate, and helps make the drainage system an exemplar for protection and shared costs.
“We worked hard upstream in the Waihou catchment, retiring land, planting trees not for water quality but for erosion, and run-off control, where the effects were felt many kilometres away downstream on the plains,” he said.
Hicks’ quiet efforts built relationships, crossing sometimes treacherous gaps between
DRAINED: Robert Hicks is proud to have been instrumental in helping keep the country’s most extensive drainage system effective for the past 40 years.
regional and district councils, and ratepayers helping keep institutional knowledge on its operations and the system itself robust and up-to-date.
That robustness was revealed in the January 2018 floods at Kaiaua on the Thames coast.
That year a low pressure system and a very high tide pushed waters another metre higher than the 1938 floods. The 3-3.5m stopbanks held well, with breaches coming mainly in areas where the stopbanks didn’t exist.
Hicks has helped keep a local level of contact and expertise about the scheme when consent processes risk it being hijacked by distant Wellington-based bureaucrats.
However, he admits the consent process is by far the biggest challenge his successors will face.
“They are so time-consuming and expensive. And schemes like this need very long-term consents, over 20 years, and the longer you seek them for, the harder they are to get,” he said.
He finds it frustrating, given the greater public good such schemes play in contributing to the entire region’s wealth.
“You have two state highways and a whole coastal region that would not be here without a scheme like this to keep the water out,” he said.
Unpacking the politics of water in Canterbury
Former IrrigationNZ chair John Donkers has long been involved in the politics of water with his many years of service to the industry recently honoured by the organisation. He talked with Annette Scott about his interest in water and irrigation.
HONORARY membership of Irrigation New Zealand recognises outstanding contribution to the organisation and the 2020 honour has been awarded to South Canterbury farm consultant John Donkers.
A farmer and dairy farm consultant for more than 25 years, with involvement in IrrigationNZ since 2003, Donkers has a good understanding of how Canterbury’s water runs.
His initial interest stems from farming in central Canterbury and the need to understand the groundwater network.
“There were a lot of new farmers in the Te Pirita area and we were all looking for water to irrigate,” Donkers said.
“There was oodles of it (water) and in response to being one of those farmers, I needed to understand the groundwater model.
A structure was to become important when Environment Canterbury (ECan) reviewed all the consents of the bordering Rakaia and Selwyn rivers.
Donkers first became involved with irrigation in 1989 when employed as a farm supervisor for corporate dairy farmer Applefields Dairy Company.
In 1994 he was part of establishing a family dairy farming operation near Dunsandel and in 1997 expanded and purchased the farm at Te Pirita, where successful drilling for water ultimately developed several farms.
“At that time, there was significant new development of irrigation from groundwater in the area and there were significant questions being raised about the reliability of the groundwater supply,” he said.
This led to the establishment of the Dunsandel Groundwater Users’ Association that assisted in funding science and modelling work to better understand groundwater systems on the Central Plains.
The organisation raised $100,000 to assist farmer members when ECan undertook the consents review.
Keen to further his understanding and involvement, Donkers put his hand up when a joint steering committee of the Selwyn District Council and Christchurch City Council was being established to investigate the opportunities for the development of water resources for the Central Canterbury Plains.
That grew to become the Central Plains Water (CPW) scheme that now irrigates 44,000 hectares.
These interests fuelled his interest in the reformation of the NZ Irrigation Association in 1999.
Consultants and famers held several meetings in Ashburton that culminated in the relaunch of the association in 2001, under the chairmanship of Ashburton consultant Bob Englebrecht.
Donkers joined the board in 2003, at a time when the association had just 100 members “and a very small budget.”
It wasn’t until 2005 and the appointment of its first chief executive Terry Heiler that the organisation gained traction with the majority of the large-scale irrigation schemes coming on board with annual memberships.
A tour of irrigation schemes in Australia soon followed and it was from this trip that the foundation for the current structure of IrrigationNZ was laid.
Irrigation and water have transformed rural communities that were once prone to drought.
It is this that has continued to spark Donkers’ interest in water management.
“There has always been a challenge to use water more efficiently and IrrigationNZ has played a big role in leading improvement in system design, installation and management,” he said.
Donkers says prior to the formation of IrrigationNZ, the irrigation sector was very fragmented.
“A scheme on one bank of the river might have a problem that a scheme on the opposite bank had under control,” he said.
“IrrigationNZ was pivotal in bringing irrigators and schemes together to share problems, ideas and solutions and it continues to do this.”
John Donkers
Irrigation is so much more than putting water on the land.
“I like to think of it as water for communities,” he said.
“It goes beyond the farm and has major social and economic influence.
“The challenge today is to operate in a way that is socially and environmentally responsible, yet enables farmers to be economically viable.”
IRRIGATION STALWART: Farm consultant John Donkers says there’s always been a challenge to use water more efficiently, and IrrigationNZ has played a big role in leading improvement in system design, installation and management. Photo: Annette Scott
Agripreneur awarded posthumously
Donkers says ideally the future will see the sector continuing to grow with increasing focus on technology to not only improve water use efficiency, but to further reduce the environmental footprint of irrigation.
“Unfortunately, irrigation has been linked to dairy farming when it is not just about that at all,” he said.
“Irrigation is about choices for farmers.
“In future the choice may be away from irrigating dairy pasture to more lucrative agricultural or horticultural crops – without irrigation there would not be this choice.
“We can’t say what the future of irrigated agriculture will be, but we can say that farmers will have more options, and all-round that’s a huge plus for the whole wider community.”
Twenty years after joining CPW, Donkers remains a director.
He is still involved with IrrigationNZ and chairs IrrigationNZ’s accreditation subsidiary. He says while standards in the industry have improved, there is still a way to go.
“But, we are growing a lot more crops on a bigger scale with a lot less water – adding a little bit of water to strategic capital has revitalised these rural
communities,” he said.
THE IrrigationNZ 2020 Ron Cocks Memorial Award for outstanding industry leadership was awarded posthumously to Graeme Tulloch, one of the original initiators of the Wairarapa Water project.
In accepting the award on behalf of their father, John Tulloch and Christine Bell said of his NZ travels with his farm machinery business, Graeme observed how some areas of the country were badly affected by water shortages in the summer.
“When the snow melts on the Southern Alps there is a lot of water in the South Island rivers but the big issue and limiting factor was, and still is, the lack of water storage capacity.
“Graeme began a crusade that went on for most of his life, which was to lobby for a water storage system for Wairarapa,” Christine said.
He always said this is the single biggest transforming project for our district.
the district would have a reliable water supply, he believed this would benefit not just the farmers but also the development of the towns and industry in Wairarapa,” John said.
For more than 20 years, and up until he died, he was involved with the Wairarapa Water Project.
A farmer, entrepreneur and businessman who never got to see the project to its completion
“Not many things beat dad in life, but he did say not long before he died, I think this one might just be the one,” he said.
“He would be delighted that the Government has now approved millions of dollars for these important projects.”
Land Champions Award winners’ key to success
CANTERBURY farming couple Ted and Sue Rollinson are the New Zealand region winners of the inaugural Zimmatic Sustainable Irrigation Awards.
The Rollinson’s own a 380-hectare dairy farm in MidCanterbury. Sharemilkers Tom and Leanne Heneghan have been on-farm for 11 years and milk 1500 cows on the property.
The Awards aim to celebrate excellence in sustainable irrigation and encourage Australian and New Zealand farmers to share ideas for achieving sustainable water management.
Each entrant was judged on the following categories: sustainable irrigation management; irrigationdriven improvements, which may include cost reductions, environmental outcomes, yield improvements and/or improved efficiencies; waterway protection; stewardship/community.
For Ted, entering the awards was an opportunity to benchmark their irrigation system, which spans 360ha of their farm, against some of the best operators across NZ and Australia. He is quick to credit the farm’s success to partnership and teamwork.
“The runs we’ve got on the board with our irrigation management have absolutely been the result of a 50:50 partnership with Tom and Leanne,” Ted said.
“We’ve all worked hard to get to this point. One hasn’t got the award without the other.”
Tom agrees and says he is grateful to the Rollinson’s for their commitment to investing in the necessary infrastructure to do the job right.
“Ted and Sue have invested heavily in the infrastructure on this farm, when they could have easily cut corners and still had a productive and profitable business. As sharemilkers, we are incredibly appreciative of that,” Tom said.
Ted and Tom also acknowledge the input of Charlotte Glass from AgriMagic, who has been their environmental consultant for more than eight years.
Awards head judge Keri
WINNERS: Ted and Sue Rollinson (right) and Tom and Leanne Heneghan won at the inaugural Zimmatic Sustainable Irrigation Awards.
Johnston says the Rollinson’s are dedicated to continuous improvement, and have been for many years.
“Ted and Sue are just as passionate today as they were when they started. The fact that they have upgraded their irrigation system several times as technology and efficiencies have improved, and are still looking for more opportunities, is testament to their commitment to being irrigation trailblazers,” Johnston said.
“They are progressive, smart farmers, who are aware of their environment, the risks and opportunities it presents, and are a valued part of their local and wider community.
“And, now with Tom and Leanne, they have another generation coming through, bringing more ideas to the table, collaborating and doing research. The strength of their partnership was really evident to us.”
Recognition from the awards comes after a complete reconversion of the Rollinson’s irrigation system from flood irrigation to spray irrigation, which took place between 2014 and 2017.
“Where our Zimmatic centrepivots cross tracks, Precision VRI is used to eliminate watering of these areas. We completed the whole conversion ourselves, re-contouring all paddocks and realigning the tracks using a 25-year-old 20-tonne digger and a 50-year-old grader,” Ted said.
Ted first came to MidCanterbury from Murchison in 1981 and was one of the first drivers of dairy in Canterbury. The word in the community at the time was that his dairying dream would only last six months before going belly up. Nearly 40 years later, dairy is now an integral part of the Mid-Canterbury economy.
Over the years, Ted has been an advocate for fair and equitable water access in the region, including working with Environment Canterbury and gaining access for farmers to local irrigation schemes. He was also chair of the Rakaia River Users Group for many years.
The judges acknowledged that the Rollinson’s have been influential in sustainable irrigation and their community for a long time.
“One of the judging categories was about sharing knowledge and supporting others in their communities to adapt and change, and Ted can certainly claim credit in this space,” Johnston said.
Ted says that while he’s had years of farming experience, there is always more to learn and the awards have been a great opportunity to do that.
“We certainly won’t let this win go to our head. We just can’t stop farming because we’ve got the award. The award is an acknowledgement of where we are as a benchmark, and we really appreciate that. We will just carry on farming and do the best we can,” he said.
“We’re looking forward to learning from the supreme winners in Australia and see what ideas we could implement here in Canterbury to help us take the next step.”
Tom says the award shows they’re on the right track, but it doesn’t mean there’s no room for improvement and using what they’ve got more efficiently.
“The day you find the perfect farm is the day you give up. And I don’t think you’ll ever find the perfect farm, with a perfect set up, with a perfect use of resources,” he said. “Nevertheless, we strive for that every day, and this award shows we’re on the right track.”
James Craft of Zimmatic ANZ, says that the awards acknowledge innovative farming operators and reward them for the vital role they play in the primary sector.
“We were extremely impressed by the calibre of applications for the award and the excellence being practiced by these farmers who are focused on improving their irrigation and water management, Craft said.
“The awards are an opportunity to help showcase the innovative farming operators who will influence future generations and play a role in strengthening NZ’s success story as global leaders in sustainable and profitable farming. We really look forward to the awards becoming a regular feature on the agricultural calendar in Australia and NZ”
Tasmanian farmers Rob and Eliza Tole of Cressy have been announced as the Australian region and Supreme winners of the awards. They have won an overseas trip for two to the US, when international travel is once again feasible.
The competition is run by agricultural irrigation systems leader, Zimmatic, with support from New Zealand awards partners IrrigationNZ, Farmers Weekly, Vantage NZ and Irricon.
Farmers Weekly is published by GlobalHQ, PO Box 529, Feilding 4740. New Zealand Phone: 0800 85 25 80 Website: www.farmersweekly.co.nz EDITOR Bryan Gibson 06 323 1519 bryan.gibson@globalhq.co.nz EDITORIAL Carmelita Mentor-Fredericks 06 323 0769 editorial@globalhq.co.nz Neal Wallace 03 474 9240 neal.wallace@globalhq.co.nz Colin Williscroft 027 298 6127 colin.williscroft@globalhq.co.nz Annette Scott 021 908 400 annette.scott@globalhq.co.nz Hugh Stringleman 09 432 8594 hugh.stringleman@globalhq.co.nz Gerald Piddock 027 486 8346 gerald.piddock@globalhq.co.nz Richard Rennie 07 552 6176 richard.rennie@globalhq.co.nz Nigel Stirling 021 136 5570 nigel.g.stirling@gmail.com PUBLISHER Dean Williamson 027 323 9407 dean.williamson@globalhq.co.nz ADVERTISING Andy Whitson 027 626 2269 New Media & Business Development Lead andy.whitson@globalhq.co.nz Steve McLaren 027 205 1456 Auckland/Northland advertising steve.mclaren@globalhq.co.nz Jody Anderson 027 474 6094 Waikato/Bay of Plenty advertising jody.anderson@globalhq.co.nz Donna Hirst 027 474 6095 Lower North Island/international advertising donna.hirst@globalhq.co.nz Ernest Nieuwoudt 027 474 6091 South Island advertising ernest.nieuwoudt@globalhq.co.nz Clint Dunstan 027 474 6004 Real Estate & Farm Machinery advertising clint.dunstan@globalhq.co.nz ISSN 2463-6002 (Print) ISSN 2463-6010 (Online) Ella Holland 06 323 0761 Livestock advertising 027 602 4925 livestock@globalhq.co.nz Debbie Brown 06 323 0765 Classifi eds/Employment advertising classifi eds@globalhq.co.nz Grant Marshall 027 887 5568 AgriHQ Partnership Manager grant.marshall@globalhq.co.nz Andrea Mansfi eld 027 446 6002 Salesforce director andrea.mansfi eld@globalhq.co.nz Steph Holloway 06 323 0142 AgriHQ Commercial Leader steph.holloway@globalhq.co.nz PRODUCTION Lana Kieselbach 027 739 4295 production@globalhq.co.nz Advertising material adcopy@globalhq.co.nz SUBSCRIPTIONS 0800 85 25 80 subs@globalhq.co.nz Printed by Ovato NZ Ltd Delivered by Reach Media Ltd
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