Saturday, March 30, 2024

Board contenders emerge

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One long-serving director and two newcomers are the preferred candidates for three Fonterra board seats this year.
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They were former Fonterra Shareholders Council chairman and nine-year director John Monaghan, of Wairarapa, former Deer Industry New Zealand chairman and farm consultant Andy Macfarlane of Mid-Canterbury, and PWC partner and National Fieldays Society board member Brent Goldsack, of Waikato.

The three have been announced as independent nomination process candidates for three vacancies among seven farmer-director seats on the Fonterra board.

They have been nominated by the board after being recommended by the independent selection panel, the Shareholders’ Council and the nominations committee.

Macfarlane had a 800-cow dairy farm near Ashburton and Goldsack was involved in a 1500-cow partnership in Waikato.

Two-term director David MacLeod from Taranaki announced he would retire from the board and the situation of one-term director Leonie Guiney, of Canterbury was not yet clear.

Along with Monaghan and MacLeod, her current three-year term ended this year but she was not one of the three preferred candidates after the official assessment and selection process.

A vocal critic of Fonterra’s governance and policies before her first election in 2014, Guiney might intend to seek re-election through the second route, that of self-nomination with the support of 35 farmer-shareholders.

Self-nomination was now open for two weeks, until September 25, the returning officer announced.

When all the candidates were known, voting packs would be sent to all shareholders on October 10, to be completed and returned by October 31.

Fonterra was in the second year of reducing its number of farmer-directors from nine down to seven.

According to the plan, only two seats were to be filled this election but a third vacancy occurred because of the resignation earlier this year through illness of Michael Spaans, only re-elected last year.

His position was filled on a temporary basis by former director Ian Farrelly, who would now stand down again at the annual meeting, to be held at Whareroa plant, South Taranaki, on November 2. 

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