Farmers encouraged to check their Greenhouse Gas number

COPING WITH DISRUPTION

Getting products to the 65 countries Tatua exports to has been challenging since the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted shipping and port operations.

“Our very capable international trade team who have strong relationships with shipping companies have so far been able to get our products to where they need to be. Having people on the ground in some of our key markets, such as Japan, China and USA, is hugely valuable as they know what is going on and can help keep our products moving.”

Tatua’s focus on quality extends to its supplying farmers too, who meet the standards of Tatua 360, the company’s responsible farming programme which aims to ensure its supplying farmers’ long-term commitment to responsible and sustainable farming practises for future generations of Tatua farmers.

The programme includes the five key elements of environmental custodianship, animal care, farm systems, milk quality and central to the programme is the welfare, wellbeing and development of people.

“Increasingly customers are looking at the whole value chain from what happens onfarm to the end products. We are audited frequently by customers and regulators who increasingly want to see what happens on farms too.”

To further its environmental credentials, the company will commission its new wastewater treatment plant within the next few months.

“This is a big investment for us at just under $15 million and follows an earlier investment in stage 1 in 2017 of around $5 million. We lost some construction time during the Covid-19 lockdown last year when we had to suspend work, but we are now close to completing the project.”

In the beginning it was just a paddock adjacent to the factory site. Now there are two 15 million litre ponds and a large amount of supporting plant and infrastructure.

“In money terms, this project brings no return on the costs to build and operate, but it is absolutely the right thing to do for the environment.” BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Embrace green values

Words by: Sheryl Haitana

Farmers generally know their nitrogen leaching number, but many are still struggling to grasp their Greenhouse Gas number and they need to embrace it, says Fraser McGougan, the new chair of DairyNZ Climate Change Ambassadors.

“We shouldn’t be afraid of these numbers, you never know, you might be already doing an amazing job.

“Some people are afraid of climate change, but there’s an opportunity here.”

A fourth-generation dairy farmer, Fraser and his wife Katherine milk 430 cows on 143 hectares near Whakatane in the Bay of Plenty. The couple won the Bay of Plenty Ballance Farm Environment Awards Supreme Award in 2019.

Farmers must look deeper into their farm systems and focus on drivers beyond production to be able to farm profitably and sustainably in the future, he says.

He believes farmers are getting their heads around farming within new environmental regulation. The climate change deniers that used to voice their opinions at fieldays seem to have disappeared.

It is also helpful that milk companies are starting to send signals through schemes like Fonterra’s Cooperative Difference with incentive payments for sustainability and farmers are getting on board.

“Ten years ago farmers would have jumped up and down about that.”

The environment has always been something Fraser has been interested in during his 20 years farming, but it has come more into focus since having three children. The Maori concept of kaitiakitanga (guardianship) makes more sense to him than ever, about being custodians of the land and leaving it in a better way for the next generations.

A book over 40 years old that Fraser reads to his children is Dr Seuss’ ‘The Land of the Lorax’ about the danger of human destruction of the natural environment.

“It mirrors what’s actually happening in the world and how humans are going to have to modify their behaviour,” he says.

In his opinion, climate change is going to be a bigger challenge for the dairy industry than fresh water legislation.

It’s a rapidly changing and evolving subject and it is a challenge for farmers how quickly rules are rolling out while science and technology are trying to keep up.

“I could see there as a huge changing space coming, personally I didn’t know enough about it. I need a reason why and I felt there was a bit of an information gap there.”

Fraser became a climate change ambassador three years ago as part of his journey to improve his own knowledge of climate change. There is a lot of information for farmers to sift through amid trying to apply the right solutions to their farms. The ambassadors help communicate the challenges and opportunities dairy farmers face in playing their part to address climate change.

The ambassadors keep in touch regularly and are great to bounce ideas off of, Fraser says.

“It’s a broad group of really intelligent people with different views.”

Fraser believes the issue needs to extend beyond just the dairy sector, and during his role as chair he hopes he can unite agricultural industries to share ideas and come up with solutions.

That’s what He waka eke noa is all about - all being in the waka together.

“This is bigger than just dairy farmers, or just agriculture, it’s everybody playing their part.”

Fraser McGougan has always been interested in the environment but says the concept of kaitiakitanga (guardianship) came into a sharper focus after having his three children.