Coby Warmington, pictured with partner Holley Millan, won the 2025 Ahuwhenua Young Maori Farmer Award on Friday.
Coby Warmington, pictured with partner Holley Millan, won the 2025 Ahuwhenua Young Maori Farmer Award on Friday.
A Northland farmer who helped transform a beef farm in his home town of Waimā has been named New Zealand’s top young Māori farmer.
Coby Warmington (Te Mahurehure, Ngāpuhi) was named the winner of the 2025 Ahuwhenua Young Māori Farmer Award on Friday, for his work as farm manager withWaima Topu Beef, in the South Hokianga.
The Ahuwhenua awards are national awards which aim to encourage Māori to improve their land and overall farming performance.
This year’s awards focus on beef and sheep farmers, with the Ahuwhenua Trophy also coming to Te Tai Tokerau having been won by Whangaroa Ngaiotonga Trust.
The Ahuwhenua Young Māori Farmer Award has been running since 2012 to showcase the development of young Māori leaders.
The other finalists were Puhirere Tau (Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Porou), who is head shepherd at Puatai Station on the East Coast and Grace Watson (Whakatohea), who is shepherd general for Verry Farming on Puketitiri Station in the King Country.
Sponsorship by Te Tumu Paeroa means each finalist received a $5000 cash scholarship, with the winner receiving an additional $5000.
The 29-year-old is the farm manager at Waimā Topu Beef, a 385ha bull beef finishing farm in Waimā, where he lives on-farm with partner Holley Millan and their four children.
Warmington is from Waimā where his passion for farming evolved from an enjoyment of being outdoors and working with animals, as well as a love for kai and feeding people.
Coby Warmington (Te Mahurehure, Ngāpuhi) is farm manager at Waima Topu Beef, a 385ha bull beef finishing farm in Waimā.
He worked as a shepherd at Oromahoe Trust, where he gained experience with intensive bull finishing systems and was supported into studies with Primary ITO.
Lured with an opportunity to move back home, he started with Waima Topu Beef in January 2021 as a shepherd/general, when the farm was at the beginning of a massive re-building phase. He became farm manager in March 2023.
Warmington has helped transform the farm from a small number of extensive paddocks, low-quality dam water and more than 100ha of mature gorse and tobacco, to 165ha of intensive grazing cells, with a robust water reticulation system and kilometres of metalled farm tracks, with gorse areas brought back into grazing.
He and the directors have also excluded stock from many waterways, native bush blocks and erosion-prone areas, and are now focusing on increasing animal performance and farm production.
Warmington said the most rewarding part of farming at home is the ability to be close to whānau, being a positive role model in his hapū and caring for his whenua.
He also enjoys playing rugby and contributes to his community through coaching kids’ rugby teams, kai mahi on the marae, cleaning and gravedigging at the urupā, and supporting the local kura.
Denise Piper is a news reporter for the Northern Advocate, focusing on health and business. She has more than 20 years in journalism and is passionate about covering stories that make a difference.
