Hard News: Five further thoughts
446 Responses
First ←Older Page 1 … 12 13 14 15 16 … 18 Newer→ Last
-
Here's one for Farmer Green...
While I'm not a farmer I live in a rural area and get a few farming tabloids delivered weekly. The latest issue of Southern Rural Life has a two page spread on Fonterra's Chinese farming operations. The photos show a massive hi-tech stall operation. But this quote got me wondering.
Our Yutian hub operates 24 hours a day, with cows milked three to four times a day to keep pace with high production from the well-fed and rested cows.
Can you really milk a cow four times a day? How sustainable is that in the long term?
Here's another quote from Fonterra's head of international farming ventures, Henk Bles.
...Fonterra's goal was to produce one billion litres of milk (in total) in China by 2020.
I'm not surer how much milk NZ produces at the moment, but wouldn't those sorts of quantities pretty much kill the international demand for NZ-produced milk? Just wondering.
-
Sacha, in reply to
It will just keep pulling people until a strategy is worked out for the civic boosting of other cities.
We only have one world-scale city and that's how it will stay. Boosting high-value sectors in other regions (such as Welli's film and IT busineses) is important but not enough to stop Auckland growing far faster than everywhere else.
-
Farmer Green, in reply to
Can you really milk a cow four times a day? How sustainable is that in the long term?
Sustainable for the cow? You can have a cow producing 5 times the volume that a cow in NZ produces. Some go even higher (100 litres /day) using hormones.. You will milk her at least three times. The cow , in a robot-milking situation, may choose 4 milkings /24 hours.
The cow will likely never conceive again , and will, at least in the U.S. situation die of progressive organ failure, at the age of 4-5 years , having milked for 500-600 days.
I'm not saying Fonterra is doing this ;; I wouldn't know.
-
Chris Waugh, in reply to
I’m not surer how much milk NZ produces at the moment, but wouldn’t those sorts of quantities pretty much kill the international demand for NZ-produced milk? Just wondering.
China has also been importing NZ dairy cows specifically to build up its own herds. Apparently native Chinese cows don't produce enough high-quality milk. Or don't produce enough and what they produce is not high-quality enough. Or something.
As for the numbers, I've gotten used to stonkingly huge numbers in news reports of industrial-scale dairy farms in China, both Fonterra's and others. I have no idea how they make such numbers happen, considering the farms are always in densely populated areas* where the water supplies are already incredibly stressed and surface water filthy.
*don't forget, large parts of China are almost empty and/or mountainous
-
Farmer Green, in reply to
I’m not surer how much milk NZ produces at the moment,
About 15 billion litres / annum . . . a drop in the bucket on the world stage. We only have 4 million cows.
Last time I looked there were about 20 million cows in India.ETA : 45 million cows in India now ; 260 million in the world.
You can see why our best strategy WOULD BE to be the "top-shelf" producer. -
Sacha, in reply to
China has also been importing NZ dairy cows specifically to build up its own herds.
Shitting me. How stupid are we.
-
Sacha, in reply to
our best strategy WOULD BE to be the "top-shelf" producer.
Yet we're exporting dried powder. How come?
-
Alfie, in reply to
We only have 4 million cows.
And apparently growing by the day. The latest info I can find from Statistics NZ puts the total at 6.4 million dairy cattle in New Zealand at 30 June 2012.
-
Alfie, in reply to
China has also been importing NZ dairy cows specifically to build up its own herds.
Shitting me. How stupid are we.
The same Fonterra article verifies that.
Most of Fonterra's Chinese herds originated from imported New Zealand fresians, with some sourced from Australia.
-
Chris Waugh, in reply to
-
Jack Harrison, in reply to
You are building on an isthmus. It's not a paddock of future suburbs. It has natural infrastructure problems. Anyway under the Treaty of Waitangi trade needs to centred up north.
-
China has also been importing NZ dairy cows specifically to build up its own herds.
Shitting me. How stupid are we.At last! Revenge on the Kiwis (Teachers?) who smuggled the fruit called "yang tao" out of China in the early 20th century?
They changed the name to "Chinese gooseberry" and then 'Kiwi Fruit'... -
Sixth further thought. One of the treaty partners voted Labour in.
-
krothville, in reply to
The cow will likely never conceive again , and will, at least in the U.S. situation die of progressive organ failure, at the age of 4-5 years , having milked for 500-600 days.
I'm not saying Fonterra is doing this ;; I wouldn't know.
That is disgusting.
-
Chris Waugh, in reply to
“yang tao”
Well, that's interesting. Kiwifruit is usually either 猕猴桃/míhóutáo or 奇异果/qíyìguǒ in modern Chinese, but I check here, and among some older names is 阳桃/yángtáo - "sun peach". Thanks, Ian!
-
Farmer Green, in reply to
Yet we’re exporting dried powder. How come?
Part of the reason is here (comment at NBR) :-
Fonterra is a very well run company , which responds rationally to the conditions in which it operates.
Those conditions amount to a protected environment.The two key components of that protected environment are the DIRA and the Fonterra Milk Price Manual.
It is perfectly evident that the sole purpose of these two documents, one of them a government statute that Jim Sutton was "heavied " into having enacted, and the other a blatant piece of nonsense designed by Fonterra to make it very difficult for competition to get off the ground, is to prevent competition and to maintain a virtual monopoly on the use of the NZ milk supply.
The reason that Fonterra needs to have that monopoly, is because its business model is 'throughput -driven". We don't need to go further into that.There is a third component to the protection of the industry , and that is the initial exemption of agriculture from the provisions of the RMA , and the inordinately long time that it is taking to make the dairy industry compliant.
It is simply a fact that the spring-calving, seasonal dairy is the most environmentally damaging model that we could design.
The agronomic reasons for this are well known; again we don't need to go into it here.It should be obvious that the way the bulk of the NZ dairy industry, i.e. Fonterra , is operating is a disaster , environmentally , economically and socially, for the whole country, but it is a perfectly rational response to the policy settings under which Fonterra operates.
It is entirely the fault of successive governments , through statute , and the failure of a powerless Commerce Commission to facilitate competition , that the dairy farmers can continue to operate in this way , to the national detriment.
Don't blame Fonterra ; they have been permitted to get away with it.
Don't worry about the dairy farmers; most will be fine.
It's NZ that we need to be concerned about.
-
Sacha, in reply to
It's not a paddock of future suburbs.
No, it's a compact city like most others around the world. Many people and businesses prefer to be close to facilities they value, not in some quaint seaside village. Plenty of those for people who're keen on them - but good luck finding a job there.
-
Sacha, in reply to
That still doesn't explain Fonterra's focus on powder over more valuable products.
-
And then the further question as to why , if Fonterra is not disposed to do added-value dairy, then why is nobody else getting off the ground:-
Further comment at NBR . (I've replaced a few pronouns with nouns to make the meaning clearer.)
#8 by Farmer Brown
"intelligent, effective regulation/competition " .Yes of course : the business environment should be designed to maximise the return to N.Z. Inc.
I am sure that Jim Sutton had this foremost in his mind when the DIRA was drafted.
He probably could not have envisaged the rort that is the Fonterra Milk Price Manual, which dictated that the milk being poured into the buttermilk lake last season, had nearly the same value as milk produced in the winter.
This pricing of dumped milk is , in terms of an efficient and transparent market , nonsense . . . . of course.Imagine a solely added-value dairy company starting up today, targeting that same affluent Asian consumer market, in which Dairy Australia believes it has a competitive advantage over NZ.
Australia believes , probably correctly, that their advantage derives from their flat milk production curve, which is itself a consequence of their relatively larger domestic market.
So expanding to become the preferred year round fresh/cultured/ luxury dairy supplier to Asia should be merely a question of growing in size , and continuing to pay a lower price to farmers for surplus milk which must go into commodities ( in OZ they call this T2 milk).A NZ added-value dairy company would have to contract its suppliers to calve in the Autumn , and milk through the winter,.
Because the cost of production will be higher, these suppliers will probably need a price around $10-12/Kg M.S. as a minimum. No problem there.Assuming that the autumn -calving dairy farmers wanted to remain seasonal, they would dry off their cows at , or slightly after, the current seasonal peak i.e.November December January.
During this summer dry period, the added -value dairy company will, initially , need to buy milk from Fonterra under the DIRA regulations .
But the added-value company will also need to buy a lot of milk in September and October , when Fonterra has milk coming out its ears ; milk that Fonterra will make into its lowest -value commodity products . . . . or milk lakes.
The question is -what price should the added-value company have to pay Fonterra for that peak milk?
The answer to that question , in a true competitive environment, would be - NOT the price that the Fonterra Milk Price Manual (which Fonterra DIDN'T follow) would dictate.
See the problem?
-
Farmer Green, in reply to
O.K. That is the collective will of the Fonterra farmer owners.
It’s easy, relatively simple , can be scaled- up , requires minimal skill, and can use imported Filipino labour, import cheap rubbish (PKE) when the margins are there, and doesn’t require the possession of some relevant consumer brands.
And you can make a mess of the commons with impunity (so far), by having far more cows than your farm will support, so you can externalise that cost.
Why wouldn’t you do it?Am I getting there?
ETA; most N.Z. dairy farmers, when confronted with the idea of flat year-round production , just turn off completely , if they can even get their heads around the mere idea.
Dairy farming, seasonal style is currently very high-stress, and the mere thought of milking cows 365 days a year turns farmers right off.
They have no idea how low -stress the year-round operation can be. -
Sacha , am I making sense for you?
Yeah , I do want to help people to understand . Because it matters for NZ. -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Thanks, Ian!
You are welcome Chris,
but best thank <cough> Wikipedia,
for the fine detail, as I do have
to check these things, first...
:- ) -
Sacha, in reply to
Am I getting there?
Thank you. Lack of ambition and nous, then. Like so many other parts of our business and civic sectors.
-
Farmer Green, in reply to
Lack of ambition and nous, then.
Yep , she'll be right.
-
im a first slash old timer at this so if theres anybody left out there be gentle with me…i watched the shellacking in a house on a lake outside Hokitika….i only had one interaction with the locals …at the New World carpark in Hoki…one guy by a ute jokes with his mate"have you voted yet?"…"yeh "said the other guy"i voted internet mana"to which the other guy said"me to,haha'…I then spoke up and said 'i really voted internet mana….true!'…to which guy one replied"i hope your the only one"…….he was wrong there was at least half a dozen of us……back in auck having a post election cry and my sisinlaw pipes up.. Labours got a constituency and its ignored and its brown,and she's so right…forget middle class white mail leaders…lets get a Maori he/she or a PI he /she to lead labour…and really connect with the disadvantaged….so they vote!…forget trying to appeal to these swingers in the centre….they are not worth the effort….have policies that lift people out of poverty,that give the poor hope……brown up Labour…[I hear the Samoan guy who stood against Paula in upper harbour is damn good…retire a whitey off the list and get him in there]……..i am of course a lower middle class whitey….who wants to be part of a truly Pacific nation
Post your response…
This topic is closed.