First up was the Dairy Women’s Network conference in Hamilton, a great opportunity for members to gather and sample some of the excellent workshops on offer.
At one business session I attended a range of inspiring speakers talked about the value of networking to them in achieving their goals. Making contacts, keeping the professional relationships that grow then enjoying the friendships that so often eventuate are a feature of dairying the industry is much the better for.
The second function I attended was a gala dinner in Auckland marking Alltech’s 34th year. Farmers need no reminding how their businesses would struggle if they weren’t able to draw on the huge level of support from commercial players carrying out research and development, supplying ever-better products and often more importantly these days, backing this up with expert advice.
The third, and by no means least, function was the Northland Dairy Industry Awards dinner at Waitangi, an opportunity for that region to recognise its brightest and best as well as some of the factors which make dairying here different to the rest of the country.
On pages 52-91, for the first time we gather all the regional winners of the Sharemilker/Equity Farmer, Farm Manager and Dairy Trainee titles from around the country together in one place. It’s great to see this year just how many finalists in the national awards, to be held on May 7, have previously been winners in the competition. They’ve put that experience to good use, gone back to the drawing board and worked out improvements they could make.
This bodes well for the future of dairying – that give-it-a-go attitude is still very much alive and well and there’s plenty to be gained from sometimes needing to repeat the process to get the end result absolutely right.
