2017 Research Seminar, AGM & Dinner

Onions New Zealand warmly invites all growers, exporters and the wider onion industry to come together before the main harvest commences to the Research Seminar, AGM and Dinner. The Research Seminar has a number of speakers addressing future  opportunities as well as addressing current concerns.

When: 1:30 pm, 18th October 2017
Where: Indian Association Hall, 59 Ward St, Pukekohe
(in the back room)
Cost: Free due to funding from ONZ & our sponsors contributions 

RSVP is Mandatory by Wednesday 11 October.
Email James Kuperus, send a letter, call or text James with the number of people attending from your organisation.

Programme details available here.

By now all Onions New Zealand members should have received a formal invitation to attend the 2017 Research Forum, AGM and Dinner. If your organisation has not please contact James Kuperus. 

Revised Constitution Accepted

Following the AGM decision to revise our Constitution it has been submitted and accepted by Charities. You can download it here>

A major change was to the Board make up, and reducing the size of the Board to 5 elected members supported by the Manager.

Current Board Members:

• John Evans – Tregynon Farm, Canterbury (CHAIR)
• Mark Burgess – Commercialisation, University of Auckland
• John van der Linden – Vineyards Systems Manager, Villa Maria
• Simon Wilcox – Operations Manager Supply, A.S. Wilcox
• Oliver Knowles – Precision Ag Specialist, Ballance AgriNutrients

Manager:

• Dan Bloomer

Meetings

The new Board met at the LandWISE MicroFarm in May after the Conference, and again in September at A.S. Wilcox in Pukekohe. We greatly appreciate being hosted and the opportunity for Board Members to better understand the business and some of the issues it faces.

We have submitted project proposals on drainage for permanent crops and good nitrogen management for vegetables to the Sustainable Farming Fund and wait on the outcome. We have also responded to an Expression of Interest to review new high precision GPS/GNNS signals that we believe can radically change some important tasks on New Zealand farms.

Conference 2018 -Tech for Timely Actions

23, 24 May 2018, Havelock North

Planning for the 2018 Annual Conference is underway, so if you have ideas or requests, please contact us. We’d love your input.

Membership Subscriptions

At the AGM we agreed to leave subscriptions at the same level, where they have sat for a number of years. But the Board has determined that the free third member offer (originally introduced for one year) will now not be offered. Board members feel the fees are very low and encourage you to join more people depending on the size of your business.

Members’ subscription invoices will be sent out soon.

One hundred and fifty farmers, technology developers, service providers and researchers joined us at our 14th Annual Conference in May 2016.

The presentation summaries are available on-line here>

Delegates left LandWISE 2016 with new understanding of how new digital technologies might help us, where current development is opening possibilities and which are offering on-farm value now and in the future.

Delegate feedback was extremely positive.

• “We’ll be back next year with a carload of colleagues!”
• “I’ve never been to a conference where the was so much interest and excitement! People went back in on time, sat on the edge of the chairs paying attention then talked nonstop all lunchtime”

Sign up for our free newsletter to receive updates about our activities and information about LandWISE 2017.

Friday 22 May 2015 (By Application)

A forum for lead farmers and technologists

Intention:   Scoping research and farm technology needs

Programme:

• 60 second introductions (all)
• Defining future farm problems and challenges
• Lead presentations
• Discussion of key issues

We have a great gathering of presenters and delegates at LandWISE 2015. We are taking the opportunity to enable a deeper discussion of key issues, and providing a forum to make new contacts and enhance networking.

There are limited places at this event for which applications are invited.

More>

Ever Better: Farmers, land and water

21 – 22 May 2014
Awapuni Function Centre, Palmerston North

Many thanks to our Platinum Sponsors, BASF Crop Protection and John Deere who actively put their support behind the conference. This extends the support they have already given LandWISE for previous events and our MicroFarm initiative.

Our Gold Sponsors are Horizons Regional Council, Potatoes New Zealand/Process Vegetables New Zealand and Trimble Ag specialists, GPS Control Systems. They are also long term and positive LandWISE supporters.

And thanks to our many returning sponsors for ongoing support, and to the new sponsors who also see benefit in the work LandWISE does.

Conference Programme

A draft programme outline is available here>

The theme reflects the increasing demands on farmers to demonstrate effective stewardship of the land and water resource that underpins their businesses. We have a guided tour of an intensively cropped catchment where farmers are working to achieve water quality that meets community expectations and values.

Having our Conference in a different region acts on our mission to promote sustainable farming and smart technologies to as wide an audience as possible. We previously held the conference in Palmerston North and Gisborne with good attendances and we expect a good response in 2014.

Other prospective Sponsors and Trade Displays can contact us anytime at info@landwise.org.nz

We want a big turnout at LandWISE 2014. We encourage you to use your communication channels to ensure as many interested people as possible know, value, register and attend. We look forward to your support.

The LandWISE MicroFarm is preparing for its second Open Day to be held at 3 pm on 2 April 2014. The two crops for discussion are sweet corn and green beans.

Green beans are a relatively new crop here, and questions over best management remain. The MicroFarm Discussion Group selected a few options this season.  Some may require following up with more investigations.

Plant arrangement and population are two key questions. Herbicide and fertiliser options are also being considered.

Tasman Harvesters Director, Gary Cutts returned from a trip to Europe where he saw most green beans are planted on 15” or 381mm rows. Gary was very keen to try the narrower row spacing. He has noticed smaller canopy crops that do not fully fill the allocated row space are difficult to harvest well.

This season we have planted one MicroFarm paddock at 15” or 381mm spacing, increasing the in-row spacing to keep the population near the norm.  At half the usual spacing for crops such as process sweetcorn or maize, fitting tyres into the mix is a challenge.

McCain Foods Field Officer, Ben Watson was interested to know what plant population might be optimal. He set up four rates from 300,000 to 370,000 plants per hectare.

Ballance AgriNutrients’ Mark Redshaw has used double rate phosphorous in one half and no phosphorous in the other. Other nutrients are the same, rates determined following soil testing at Hill Laboratories.

Scott Marillier and Vaughan Redshaw at Fruitfed Supplies selected a standard herbicide programme for most of the area. Haydn Greville applied 600mL/ha BASF Frontier and 500mL/ha Magister as a pre-emergent spray. This was followed by 3L/ha BASF Bentazone at two trifoliates.

By the end of February the buried drip had applied four 10mm irrigations. That was enough to keep just above stress point.

HydroServices’ soil moisture monitoring showed the un-irrigated paddocks were stressed from early on. Funding constraints have prevented us getting the dream irrigation system so we started using our mini-gun, applying 20-35mm at the end of February.  While adequate on pasture, it is not ideal for crops.

Many
thanks to Thanks to: Centre for Land and Water, ThinkWater, Netafim, HydroServices, McCain Foods, Ballance AgriNutrients, BASF Crop Protection, FruitFed Supplies, Agronica NZ, Nicolle Contracting, Te Mata Contractors, Drumpeel Farms, Greville Ground Spraying, True Earth Organics, Tasman Harvesting Plant & Food and Peracto for support with this work.