The Country 20/02/25: Katie Milne talks to Jamie Mackay

The former President of Federated Farmers talks about drought (really?) on the West Coast, feeding out in summer, and whether this is Climate Change in action. As for the Paris Climate Accord; in or out? And what interest in farm sales is there on the Coast?

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So we're going to kick it off with the woman.

(00:02):
I guess who broke the grass ceiling. She was the
first female president of Federated Farmers West Coast kow Kocky,
Katie Milon, Katie, good afternoon. You're telling me that you're
almost were almost in drought conditions on the West Coast.
I can't believe that. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
It's been a game of two seasons, game two halves
this year, Jamie. We had horrendous rain from August through
to Boxing Day and it just a few two or
three days in between. But then, of course, as happened,
when it breaks on the coast, you get this great
weather have It's a great place to come for a
summer holiday. And prior to two three nights ago, we'd

(00:42):
only had forty two miles in the you know, for
two months from precious time, so we were desperate for
that bit of rain. Gray Valley looked pretty dry and
first time we've had feed out through somewhere ourselves. So
glad to have seen that rain.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
So this is climate change in action. As to Katie,
can we afford to pull out of the Paris Climate Accord?

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Well, that's a real interesting one that you know, people
always notice things changing on their farms over over time,
and it's how you adapt to it. Actually, is what
I've always thought a lot of people agree that, you know,
you've got to spend your money in that area versus
this mitigation joke that goes round about how to do that.
But the interesting thing to me, Jamie about the Paris

(01:28):
Accord is that the original articles were quite clear when
it came to food production that you had to make
sure that you protected food security food production in your
efforts to do things about climate change. So that's where
one of the big keys to me that why we
have gone down some real strange tracks in New Zealand
agriculture with mitigation and the way that we look at

(01:50):
it being we have to reduce stock numbers. It doesn't
make any sense.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
No, it doesn't exactly. And those twenty thirty targets which
James and just underside up to minds you the that's
have gone one further, but we'll go back. Are there
targets of a fifty percent reduction in our greenhouse gas
emissions by twenty thirty plainly is not achievable.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
No, And a lot of that came from the Burg
report was Bilogical Missions Research Group put forward and that said,
if you had everything lining up in perfection, then you
could possibly achieve on the best day, reductions of up
to that amount, but it's totally unrealistic. That meant that
everybody had to have all the reducts in the line.

(02:33):
It meant everybody had to use fodder beat That was
one of the biggest reductions. And of course we know
that there's some environmental issues that have to be really
well managed. If you go down that track, it meant
you had to get a vaccine or a bowl off
for something that worked, and a whole lot of factors that
were just ridiculous, you know, best case scenario stuff plass
as we know, this act stated that and as a

(02:54):
state that New Zealand was where if you're not adding
more animals into the system, you're not adding to warming.
What was the problem anyway.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
It's interesting this government has the goal of doubling export
income in the next decade. I can't, for the life
and me see how we do it without dairy farming.
As I say, doing some of the heavy lifting, but
I'm not sure it's environmentally realistic to increase the number
of dairy cows in this country. What do you say,
you're a cowcocky?

Speaker 2 (03:22):
Yeah, I think it can be managed. It is one
of those things where people have stepped up to the plate,
you know, as environmental issues have come along, and we
get the science to show us what's gone wrong, put
some investment into fixing those things. We can do it,
but we do have to be careful where and how
we go about it. There's no doubt about that. Yes,

(03:43):
the increased genetics capability of our animals things like that
are all pretty good. And I've known that a lot
of people see those games over a few years and
that's quite exciting to see. And if you can get
that with lower methane outputs, that's fine, but if it
means lower production then of course that's pointless. Again. So yeah,
it is menageable though, and I think we have to

(04:05):
be realistic that we can look at other things out sequestration.
We don't allow it for bashes and stuff, and for
animals we are looking at through the predator free movement,
what the benefit is when you lower those the pressure
on the forest. That's the genuine game that is there
to be had, and we haven't really put that into
the system yet to see if there's other offsets if

(04:28):
you're stuck in that system that we can utilize that
meet our NDC's which is what bite us in the Barnam.

Speaker 1 (04:35):
Yeah, I reckon if we measured everything that sequested carbon,
it wouldn't be an issue. But anyhow, I've banged on
about that one enough. We're going to talk very shortly
to Peter Newbold from PGG Rights and about what your
farm's worth. You sent me an email earlier this morning
say farmers are, especially dairy farmers at the moment of
sitting on farms when they maybe had thought of selling
them because they're banking the current good returns. What are

(04:57):
you seeing on the West Coast.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
Well, actually we might be a little bit opposite to that.
There's a wee bit of noise kicking around and a
bit of interest kicking around for farms to move, and
people are taking that opportunity, you know, if they're getting
a bit long on the tooth, let's say, to take
the chance to have succession and move on and fun
retire or do whatever. And of course the West Coast
is one of those places that still when you look

(05:21):
at the books, you don't actually make a lot on
capital gains, but you make profit as you go when
you're farming. Northland and the West Coast have always been
some of the best places to buy land because it's
cheap and you can make money as farm. Yes, it
has some challenges around a bit of weather as we've
discussed earlier, but great place coming look in the bench,

(05:42):
looking at us and going yep, you're all good to go,
get some people in and buy farms.

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Well there you go on and all you need is
like a line seven Parker and a good set of
leggings exactly. Hey Katie Milne, always good to catch up.
Appreciate your time here on the country.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
No, all good, Thanks Jamie.