The Country 19/01/26: Graeme Williams talks to Jamie Mackay

East Coast farmer and bush poet asks whether carbon farming will be the demise for some in rural New Zealand, and he reflects fondly on being in a debate with the late Sir Tim Shadbolt. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Great to be back on the tools here on the country.
Here's a guy I always enjoy yarning too, because he's
always interested in Graham William's East Coast Farmer or former farmer,
bush poet. And before we talk about forestry and farming
and all sorts of things happening on the East Coast, Graham,
you've got a bit of a background with the late
Sir Tim Shadbolt. Good afternoon you, Good.

Speaker 2 (00:22):
Afternoon, Jamie, and happy New Year to you and all
the listeners. Your story about old Tim. Back in the nineties,
our mate Geordie Witters organized the Shadow and hlnge up
here and Gisbon and I was on a team with
Gary McCormick and Shad Bolton, and I always whenever I
see him, it reminds me of the story. And he
said he was at a civic reception when the Queen
came out and he was sitting right beside her, and

(00:43):
he said the hardest thing he did all night, because
he'd only ever seen the Queen on a postage stamp,
was to control himself from not licking the back of
her head. And every time I see Shadbolt, it reminds
me of that story. But he was a character, fantastic character.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
Absolutely gone, but not forgotten. You forwarded me as story
one of your mates, Paul Bert. I think his namers
who farms at? Where does he farm at?

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Mattatar which man?

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Sorry, yes, I know where that is? And the Bay
of Plenty And this is kind of a bit symptomatic
of what's happening out there. You know, the forestry is
taking over some of these sheep and beef properties for
better or worse. And he's resurrected an old wolfshed.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah. Well, Paul will be known to most of rural
New Zealand. He's written extensively in farming magazines and a
really good writer, Paul, and a fellow who's spent his
time on a handpiece and he knows MutS and bolts,
and he's just talking about his area. There's been about
twenty ballot farms that sort of in nineteen fifty five
to nineteen seventy five lands and Survey developed them, and

(01:46):
you know a lot of young farmers went in and
cut their teeth there, and just with the way things
are going, you know a lot of them have been
gobbled up with forestry, which is systematic of what's happened
throughout New Zealand, and he has just wrote this story
about taking this woolshed off the land and closing the
gate and all that history's gone. And so that sort
of resonated with me. And then on Saturday's paper another

(02:09):
made of mine James Hunder from put on the Hoe
down in Central Hawk's Bay, who's been making plenty of
legitimate noise about you know, the forestry and the potential
fire risk and things and the demise of rural New Zealand,
and that sort of hit a note with me. And also,
you know, I sort of resonated that with what's happened

(02:30):
up on the east coast here recently. On the seventh
of January, the McNeil farming up at Pokato, they had
their annual sale and Puka Toro's right next door to
who here, which is another property which has been bought
by IQ for carbon forestry, and they had this magnificent
sale there. They grows just over four million dollars for

(02:52):
the annual sale of livestock. There they run, you know,
they've got one hundred and ten thousand stop units, a
lot of people that have got a real community. And
after the sale, I drove up the road for the
group of mates. We looked across on some production forestry
which the companies have pulled the pin on because it's
uneconomic to farm it to harvest it. Sorry. And on

(03:15):
the other side of the road, on the other side
of Pookaturo was who you were, which is just being
planted by it, and you could farm dairy cows on it.
And I just thought, there's nothing right about this. As
James Hunder said in the paper, this carbon forestry is
the dumbest thing New Zealand has ever done in agriculture.
And so I just correlated all those things together, Jamie,

(03:35):
and I've written a little poem called the Demise of
Rural New Zealand.

Speaker 1 (03:39):
Hey Graham, and just before you get into your poem,
this is ironic, isn't it. I was talking to one
of my people in the meat industry this morning. Are
nearly eleven dollars a kilo for lamb at the moment,
beef at nine dollars. It's never been better that land
should be growing sheep and beef, not carbon farming.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Anyhow, where you go, the demise of rural New Zealand
is occurring before our eyes and it appears that only
deaf ears are listening to our cries. The majority are
oblivious to it as it's hidden from their view. And
I'm sure it wouldn't be happening if people only knew

(04:19):
save the planet and save the world's successive government, please
sacrifice productive farming land for ideological carbon trees. The cost
is astronomical, socially, economically, and personally. It defies common sense
and logic that people are choosing not to see, not

(04:41):
a region in New Zealand from the scourge it has
been spared from ill conceived vote catching agendas from politicians
who supposedly cared I care, for example, planting New Zealand's
fertile loam. If it's such a planet, so why haven't
they done it back at home? For traditional rural New Zealand,

(05:05):
this reality it is no joke and as prolonga host
James Hunter will tell you, one day there will be
smoke California and Ozzie from them. You'd think we'd learned
that if you play with fire then it's inevitable that
you'll get burnt. This is real New Zealand and who

(05:27):
we all once were. Now we're becoming a wasteland of
foreign pine and con affur, allowing foreign carbon farmers our
fertile rolling loam. Makes a mockery of the statement that
charity must always begin at home. And that's how I
sort of sum up those two good top copies. Paul

(05:50):
Bert and James Hunter and the message are trying to
get through to death. He is, Jamie, well that.

Speaker 1 (05:54):
James Hunt is paying on the money. The dumbest thing
we're going to do. We're going to pay a big
price for this in the next teen or twenty years.
Graham Williams, Happy New Year, will catch your back.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
Good on you, Jamie. So you