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Can grass-fed Wagyu beef become a new health food?
Zoonoses prone should raise their hygiene game. PAGE 38
New land ownership regulations causing uncertainty in the rural sector. PAGE 16
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TO ALL FARMERS, FOR ALL FARMERS JULY 17, 2018: ISSUE 657
www.ruralnews.co.nz
Answers raise more questions DAVID ANDERSON
TAXPAYERS WILL fork out about half a million dollars a year to fund the new Primary Sector Council (PSC), the brainchild of Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor. This information comes to light after a series of questions asked by Rural News under the Official Information Act (OIA) about the costs and formation of the PSC. The OIA was request sent to the Minster of Agriculture’s office in early June, but passed on to MPI to answer as it was deemed “an operational matter”. “It’s because the details you requested in your OIA were operational matters and the responsibility of MPI. The ministry is tasked with the administration of this council; under the Act the Minister has a duty to transfer
[the request],” the minister’s office responded. Rural News’ request for details of the costs and spending to set up the PSC was refused by MPI. “The specific information requested for establishment expenditure and costs is not available,” MPI responded. “Accordingly, I am refusing your request under section 18(e) of the
OIA.” However, despite MPI’s refusal to provide details of these costs, the minister’s office confirmed to Rural News that the PSC will have an “estimated annual cost of $400,000 - $500,000” and two MPI staff will administer it “not full time, [only] estimated 0.75 FTE (full time equivalents)”. MPI confirmed that $300,000 -
Milk processing A farmer feeds out hay to a herd of cows wintering on a block near Mount Somers, Mid-Canterbury, on a fine winter’s afternoon late last week. While much of the country has endured wet wintry weather, Canterbury has generally escaped the mud so far.
AWFUL OFFAL PIT SORTED PETER BURKE peterb@ruralnews.co.nz
$350,000 had been budgeted annually for the cost of meetings, room hire, airfares and accommodation for the council. Administration is expected to cost $100,000 - $150,000 a year on top of this, but this is only an estimate. “A cost estimate has been provided as, at this stage, no firm decision has been made on the number of council TO PAGE 5
NORTHLAND REGIONAL Council (NRC) has inspected an illegal offal pit at a farm in Northland that is also the subject of a separate complaint about animal abuse. Animal rights group Farmwatch sent media photographs of dead, rotting cows lying in an open paddock near a stream behind the farm. Farmwatch spokesperson John Darroch claims that when the activists arrived at the scene, rats were running over the carcases. He says the gully was about 10m from a stream and 20m from a swamp. NRC’s group manager regulatory services, Colin Dall, told Rural News the so-called offal pit did not comply with its regulations requiring pits to meet certain standards, one of which is that animals must be covered. He also says the pit on the Mangapai dairy farm did not have a consent and so is illegal. Dall says the council told the farm owners last week that dumping dead stock in the open near a stream is illegal. The owners then removed the stock and buried them at a site which met council rules. The council has not yet decided whether the farm owners will be prosecuted. @rural_news facebook.com/ruralnews
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