By PHILIPPA STEVENSON
A farmers' lobby group hopes to end the lull in dairy industry battles with a call for grassroots action.
Quiet descended on the industry last month following the failure of the merger between giants New Zealand Dairy Group and Kiwi Dairies, which was the key to wider industry
integration between manufacturing and marketing arms.
The mega co-op that would have been formed was widely viewed as the industry's best structural option to tackle strengthening competition from international dairy companies, and growing retailer power.
Neither company has revealed alternate plans, with Dairy Group focusing on finding ways to reduce its 16-member board, and to alter its share structure to handle the milk growth it clamped down on during merger talks. The Kiwi board is in for a change, with chairman John Young stepping down in June.
Now Dairy Farmers of New Zealand hopes to get the mega co-op ball rolling again with an emergency meeting of delegates in Hamilton tomorrow.
Spokesman Kevin Petersen said it was "time to stop absorbing information and take action on behalf of farmers." The meeting would look for consensus on key principles, which could include the need for critical mass, and the integration of manufacturing and marketing.
"We will be asking whether these are the most important things to fight for," Mr Petersen said.
Action from the meeting could be a call for Dairy Board shares to be put into farmers' hands, instead of being held by the manufacturing firms, he said.
The shareholding switch has been mooted by other groups. It is seen as a way to have a "reverse takeover," with farmers using their direct ownership of the Dairy Board to force the firms to go along with their mega co-op wishes.
