Our people section of our Integrated Farm Plans

On Tuesday 7th May we had our first full Integrated Catchment Workshop for 2024. We had deliberately given our farmers ‘space’ from this mahi, as we had all been successful in being accepted into the NZ Vet Council initiative to deliver individualised Animal Health & Biosecurity plans by our local vets.

The day began with AgRecycling and a chance to catchup with neighbours over lunch.

We had a brief refocus session to allow people to see how the pieces fit together and where we are ‘up to’ in achieving our ultimate goal of all Guardians of the Ruakituri properties having a comprehensive Integrated Farm Plan. The land Use mapping is ongoing, with Pete Mansen continuing to visit on farms and the timing/coverage plan was shared:

The focus of the day was within the ‘people’ section of the plan. The Guardians were provided with a selection of providers to assist with ensuring they had the knowledge and provision to be ‘checking off’ the essential items within their own plans.

Our guest speaker Ricky Bullock, shared his experience and learning as part of the Beef & Lamb Nz Generation next. It was awesome to hear how positive Ricky was about the programme and encouraging of other younger farmers to sign up with Beef & Lamb. Find out more about GenNext here: https://beeflambnz.com/programmes-partnerships/people-and-training/personal-development-programmes/blnz-generation-next

Providers for our Pic n Mix session included:

• Kahungunu Executive: Health Checks with the nurses
• Red Cross: Defribulator training
• Beef & Lamb: GenNext plus a chance to talk to the Extension Manager Mark Harris about the wide options for farm learning and up-and-coming workshops
• Ospri NAIT: Rhea helping sort out any issues and assisting with any Wand issues
• Federated Farmers: Employment Contracts & Pay discussions
• RABO Bank: financial workshops on offer and banking opportunities
• HBRC Councillor Di Roadley: weather monitoring tools and 3yr LTP; unpacking rates
• REAP: Programme coordinator Hine Flood sharing what education programmes they offer
• AgRecovery https://agrecovery.co.nz/farmers-and-growers/

A huge thank you to all these providers for making themselves available, it was a really rich environment for our farmers to engage with services on an individual and need to basis.

The remaining significant aspect is the Health & Safety Plans. These are highly individual and quite extensive so will be achieved as part of the On-Farm Visit series. Our special thanks go to Shanna from Agfirst Gisborne for facilitating the day.