The biggest agricultural event in the southern hemisphere is underway, with the annual Fieldays event kicking off at Mystery Creek yesterday.
Fieldays will run for the next four days, featuring 1100 exhibitors and vendors.
On day one, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced $59 million in Primary Sector Growth Fund investments across six projects with a combined value of $143 million. The projects included initiatives to boost beef and sheep production, grow dairy output, increase the value of kiwifruit orchards, expand open ocean salmon farming and investigate higher-value uses for industrial-grade logs.
Also unveiled was a new policy of $10,000 in rural scholarships to back emerging primary sector leaders, a new funding package for rural communities that ensures they are equipped to face intense weather events, and NZ First announced a new policy of investing nearly $100,000 to support the Rural Champions Wellbeing Programme, ACT used the Fieldays to reaffirm its pledge not to “sacrifice farmers for Paris targets,” proposing an approach that would treat methane differently from carbon dioxide and keep agriculture out of the Emissions Trading Scheme.
Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis announced an investment of up to $51 million in an Early Adoption Accelerator programme to help roll out methane-reducing farming technology.
However, RCR host Jaspreet Boparai criticised the methane project as a waste of taxpayer funds. “According to the Government’s own figures, New Zealand’s agricultural methane emissions are projected to cause roughly 0.000004°C of global warming per year over the 2000–2100 period.
“In the mixed earth atmosphere, there is no discernable warming at all. Yet the gravy train continues,” Boparai said.
Read more at RNZ, Stuff, RNZ, NZ Herald, BusinessDesk, beehive.govt.nz and NZ First on X.
