The Country 11/04/25: Nathan Guy talks to Jamie Mackay

The former Minister of Agriculture and current chairman of the Meat Industry Association shares a birthday with Winston Peters.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So as fate would have at Winston Peters is not
the only one having a birthday today. This guy's having
one former Minister of agriculture these days, chair of the
Meat Industry Association. I got him on to talk about
Trump and his tariffs. But Nathan Guy, happy fifty fifth birthday.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Yeah, your research is very good, Jamie, thanks very much
for that. I'm feeling young at heart.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Well, so you should. You're still a very fit man,
still out there running around like a spring chicken. So
good on you. Well, let's start with is it your
day job as a farmer. I don't know if I
can say that, but you're a horror fino, a dairy farmer.
Is the drought over in your neck of the woods.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Yes it is, Jamie, Thank goodness. I'm standing on a
sandhill overlooking the farm, dropping up some firewood to my
dear mother, and I'm seeing green grass most places. But
should it was very tough. It's wine and clock back.
A couple of weeks we were very desperate for rain.
We've had little bits of rain, but just not enough.
Even right now it's greened up, but we still need

(01:02):
follow up. Brain, and that's right the way through to wanging,
he Taranaki. I haven't been up in the way kattow
for a while, but I hear that's pretty bad too.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Yeah, hopefully this is the start. This is the green shoots,
and I hate that terminology. Are we seeing any green
shoots out of Trump and as tariffs? I mean to
be honest, we don't know what the hell's happening there.
But I was reading something online yesterday saying that our
beef is so much in demand in the US that
they're happy to pay the ten percent tariff.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yes, that's right, that's the feedback I'm getting. There'll still
be a few games that we played at the border
with importers, I'm sure. But the reality is coming off
the back of a very prolonged to the heard rebuild,
the worst in about fifty three years. So there's a
shortage of beef. The world is a state of flux,
so isn't that, Jamie. At the moment, no one quite
knows what to believe and what's happening. I see that

(01:54):
China's now got a tariff over one hundred percent, so
that's bizarre. We don't know what products going to end
up were, but the demand out of the US my
belief it will still be strong. They love their hamburgers.
I heard a stat the other day. I think it's
three a week they consume. So we're a big part
of that, and letsobe it continues.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
The big problem for us, though, is not a ten
percent tariff on sending meat into Our biggest red meat
market are the US. It's the collateral damage around the
rest of the world that's going to affect us as
a trading nation. And it's a bit like farming and
the weather. We have no control over that.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
No, that's right. But what I would say is our
exporters are very nimble, they are very adaptable, and they're
thinking and freight channels and looking at markets. And I've
been here before. If you think about the National Land
Day that we celebrated recently, it's a long time ago
since that first shipment of sheep meat went up to

(02:51):
the UK, and our markets have grown, We've adapted consumer
tastes of growing. So I take my head off to exporters.
The vagary to trade is real, and I've been dealing
with it a long time. It just so happens that
this is quite bizarre what's happening at the moment.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Nathan Guy with US, chair of the Meat Industry Association.
The really good news story, in some ways surprising story
of this season has been the renaissance of lamb eight
dollars a quilo or better and it wasn't really predicted.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
No, that's right, And my mates and the sheep farmers
are feeling a lot of love at the moment, and
that's come off the back of two very tough years,
so feeling a lot more confident than their returns. There's
a lot of catch ups bending that needs to happen
in sheep and beef land and no doubt banks will
be relieved, but there'll be a lot of R and

(03:43):
M that they need to do. So yeah, it's strong
in the US, it's looking not too bad in the
UK and EU. So for sheep meat farmers, good time
shit to come and hopefully they're going to hang around
for a while. And good news at the Government's decided
to invest a it in when near government building, so
that's another positive announcement to speak.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
Well, that's a very positive announcement. What about Luckson's talk
of a trade block outside the US.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Well, I thought that there was a so called little
stash between he and Winston Peters. I didn't think it
was that at all. Prime Minister Lucks and doing what
he should be doing, and that's ringing other prime ministers
and taking a bit of a heat temperature check from them,
and the Foreign Affairs Minister is saying, well, let's pull
our jets and see what happens between the US and China.

(04:32):
So I think what they're both doing and saying is
absolutely correct. We need call heads, but we need to
be talking to our very strong trading partners where Prime
Minister Lucks has built up those relationships, and it's great
to see that. Todd mcclay's up there in the UAE
had a massive investment summit, so you know, there's a
lot of things happening in the space that are very positive.

(04:54):
But we know right now we've got a strong head
wind in our face as well.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
Tom McClay, by the way, I think it's doing a
great job. Brady, are you're blowing out fifty five candles today?
Winston eighty, he's got a cast iron constitution, that man.
He is in a lot of ways, Nathan the most
influential politician of our lifetime.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
Well, I know Winston from my fifteen years in parliament
and I've had a lot of respect and still respect
his work ethic and what he's doing for us on
the international stage. So I think that he's had a
fantastic political career and who knows how long it last,
but certainly right now he's got a bit of a
spring this step. I wish him happy birthday. It's a

(05:35):
lot of candles to blow out, more than mine.

Speaker 1 (05:38):
Well, there's also thirty one candles being blown out by
me today. It's not my birthday, but it's the birthday
of Radio Hockenily Limited. So on this day, thirty one
years ago, not as long as you're fifty five or
Winston's eighty, a guy by the name of Lee Piper
and another guy by the name of Gratnersbet and myself
set up a little radio station and gore the little

(05:59):
station that could have that's still going. I'm very proud
of it.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, well done, Jamie, and I thought it was appropriate.
You got your recognition the honors last year. And let's
all raise a toast to the primary sector tonight.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
Let's raise a toast to Winston Haiti not out, Nathan guy,
thank you very much for your time, Thanks many