Richard Lindroos: CEO of National Fieldays on the agribusiness event kicking off today

Fieldays kicks off at Mystery Creek today. 

The rural sector’s somewhat bullish from its record profits across dairy and red meat, and pundits are expecting farmers to be “speaking with their wallets”. 

Big crowds are expected, with many looking to take advantage of the new tax rebate on the big ticket items. 

CEO of National Fieldays Richard Lindroos told Mike Hosking it’s the largest agribusiness event in the southern hemisphere, with over 100,000 going through the gates over the four days. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Celebration of life on the land rolls on. This week
we got field Days, Mystery Creek opening today. Couple of
key drivers of course, won the budget move around appreciation
to the general bullishness of the farming sector. Richard Lindrews
is the CEO of the National Field Days and as well.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
As Richard morning, Yeah, morning Mike.

Speaker 1 (00:15):
No excuse for it not to go off? Is that fair?

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Is it? Yeah? Exactly right? I mean all the they
say down here, it's a bit of a positive vibe
going on. Everything's gone the right direction. We have certainty
now in terms of where the prices are and the
forecast are pretty good, so we expect the royal community
to open up the wallets at field Days.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Fantastic. The reality of that twenty percent from the budget.
The depreciation is that tangible and will you see it?

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Yeah, what's real. I think you're going to see those
large capital expenser and there's more certain you have from
the farming community, the better it will be. So our
exhibit is down here and we have over twelve hundred
are looking forward to gates opening at eight o'clock today.
We go right through to saur Day Sad as Super
Sad day. So looking forward to even the town is
coming down.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
Have you got a sense of the size of it
and who's coming and how many and all of them?

Speaker 2 (01:02):
Yeah? Absolutely, So we have firstly, internationally we have twenty
three embassies represented here, over sixty six international exhibitions, and
over twelve hundred overseas visitors, so give us some context
of the international following of Field Days. But also domestically
we'll have over one hundred thousand people through the gates
over four days. It makes it the large the largest

(01:25):
agribusiness event of the summer's hemisphere, but also you would
say the largest business event in New Zealand. And that's
why today and tomorrow it is politician central. They are
all here. I've just seen mister McLay. In fact, I've
just seen Brad Olsen, one of your guests, as the
first person to the VIP club.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
That's what he does, it's all head does. He goes
around dancing, drinking, entering VIP clubs. He loves a party.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
It was the first one in here. I was a
bit surprised about that. So I don't think you are.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
God look at bless them.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
So it's you know, we're really looking forward to today.
Lots going on the first two days are the business
days and then as we head towards the weekend, it's
becomes more of a family focused and so we're expecting
the large crowds to continue this here.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Okay, what are you going to tell the government? Give
them the government there? Are they perceived to be on
your side? Are they doing what's needing to be done?
And is everyone happy?

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Broadly? Well, I think actually both sides of the political spectrum.
Agri business is that you know, the revenues we get
from the agri sector industry are popping up this economy
and I've heard you say about a two tiered economy. Well,
what we've got to do is we've got to recycle
that the agri money into the urban fields as well.
So I think at field Days, what we're trying to

(02:42):
do is as a society, we try and grow this
event not just in size, but in terms of impact.
And we're very ambitious what that future holds for New
Zealand primary sector and we believe the field Day's event
is vital role in playing that.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
Fantastic Richie, good to have you on the program. I
love the talk. Richard Lindrews, who's the chief executive officer
of the National Field Days bred Alton. By the way,
it was at the Radio Awards the other night as well,
brought his own ticket.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
I mean, when you see drink gloves to drink, it's
not true.

Speaker 1 (03:08):
Well no, no, if you never drink. He loves it.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
He loves a red ball, loves we've established. But to
arrive and what are we talking about an hour and
minutes before it even starts R That guy's desperate to party.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
That guy is a Yeah, he's as keen as a being.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
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