Major rural quarter added to Royal Show

Hawke's Bay A and P Society general manager Brent Linn, pictured in 2011 as the society disposed of gates from its sheep pavilion. The open space has enabled them to find new uses for the showgrounds' expansive pavilions for the Royal New Zealand Show on October 21-23.

A major international-style rural quarter is being developed at the Royal New Zealand Show in Hastings in five weeks' time.

The move will see the complete use of the 5000sq m sheep and shearing pavilions for the first time in several years, a huge step for the Hawke's Bay A and P Society, which has revived the sheep sections it had to cancel in 2010 because of the decline in the numbers of entries across the categories.

A and P Society general manager Brent Linn said a crucial part of the move had been a decision to import a six-stand shearing board and pens from Marton to be erected in the sheep pavilions, for the show on October 21-23.

The four-stand shearing pavilion, built along with the rest of the covered yards in the 1940s, will still be used, giving the show the unique capacity to use 10 stands during the day - possibly a record for any show worldwide.

The six-stand board will be used for all finals, with spectator seating for at least 400 people, well up on the 200-300 who pack the shearing pavilion each year for the Great Raihania Shears finals, which commemorate the first machine shearing competition in the world, shorn at the Hawke's Bay A and P Show in 1902.

Mr Linn said the society had long seen the shearing and wool handling competition as "the great hidden secret" of the show, and had been looking at ways of making it more accessible and "bringing it out into the open".

The philosophy in staging the show in recent years has been to develop a pasture-to-plate concept with the food product of primary industry, and the show now has the chance to develop a similar concept of fibre production through to fabric.

"The public will get to understand that shearing is a highly skilled craft and one that yields this wonderful fibre, with all these wonderful uses," he said.

"Sometimes we've had three or four world champions there competing at the same time, and some of them are from Hawke's Bay."

Meanwhile, the deadline for show entries across the animal classes to be included in a special souvenir catalogue is tomorrow.

The society has catalogues dating back to the 1870s and Mr Linn said it is trying to restore prestige of having entries in the publication. The society had produced catalogues "on site" in recent years, but has now moved to a print-company publication.