Immigration New Zealand has a proposal out to alter the Immediate Skills Shortage List (ISSL), removing the Herd Manager and Assistant Herd Manager roles from this list.
Their reasoning is that only skilled positions should be on the ISSL and that these two roles are not skilled.
In this time of rising unemployment the Government wants to see New Zealanders fill these roles, not migrants. If, after advertising, there are no suitable locals, farmers are still able to recruit from overseas.
Federated Farmers has used the Workplace Action Plan as proof the dairy industry is wanting New Zealanders, and there are initiatives in some provinces (Ashburton, for example) that are busy upskilling people to work in the dairy industry.
In the long term this will see more skilled New Zealanders who want to work in the dairy industry, but in the meantime there could be a shortage.
Federated Farmers will be submitting on this policy.
DIRA
I had thought I could have another year off this topic, but forgot that the Dairy Industry Restructuring Act (DIRA), in its amendment in 2012, required that the state of competition at the farm gate and the factory gate be reviewed in 2015.
Consequently the dairy executive team and I have thought about what a successful dairy industry would look like and submitted this to the Commerce Commission, who is advising the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI).
The Commerce Commission has now done its draft review (see http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/dairy-industry/) and has opened the draft up for comments. We will of course be submitting.
FARM DATA STANDARDS
Filing things once online is the aim of Andrew Hoggard, Federated Farmers Dairy Chairperson.
The evolving demand for farming to address areas such as environmental compliance and improvements to productivity and profitability has translated into farmers needing to give facts and figures about their farms to multiple entities.
This Farm Data Standards project is focused on getting standards across the agriculture sector so that this won't be necessary.
Data will be able to be exchanged in a safe environment, which will in turn promotes innovation. The Data Standards being developed are:
* Animal
* Land Application
* Stock Reconciliation
* Feed & Grazing
* Irrigation & Effluent
* Financial
* Chart of Accounts
Federated Farmers has a seat at the Board which governs the Farm Data Code of Practice.
SUPPORT FOR SHAREMILKERS AND DAIRY FARMERS
Federated Farmers and DairyNZ have partnered up to provide help for sharemilkers during this time of low milk payouts. Our role is to partner experienced farmers with sharemilkers and their farm owners to help them work through options to make sure the shared business pulls through.
Local meetings have been held to bring dairy farmers off farm to share a meal and have a change in scenery.
CONTRACTS
We have spent a lot of time this year on contracts that are essential for dairy farmers. None of this work is quick to do as it involves discussing the options for each scenario, writing the contract in a way that makes sense to farmers and our lawyers (and to me) and testing it with farmers. This year's offering was:
* Contract for contract milking
* Grazing Contract, for heifer, winter/seasonal and dry stock
* Land Lease
* Individual Employment Contracts (Permanent and Fixed Term)
