Neal Wallace

Data released yesterday reveals wages rising at a record pace, but economists view this as no impediment to further interest rate cuts by the Reserve Bank.

The impact of southern farms switching to dairying is having a flow-on effect on the dryland Strath Taieri region.

The price of superphosphate fertiliser could reach $700 a tonne by Christmas, according to the head of one of the country's leading manufacturers and retailers.

A merger between the country's largest meat companies, Alliance and Silver Fern Farms, is seen by farmers as essential to solving the industry's woes, but is it likely? Agribusiness Editor Neal Wallace reports that a history of animosity makes it unlikely.

Disposing of dairy shed effluent is not straightforward.

Meat and Wool New Zealand chairman Mike Petersen is perhaps being a little optimistic in viewing a dispute about the new structure of the wool industry as a catalyst for unity, as the Council of Wool Exporters, representing 40 sector players, has responded with some hostility to the establishment of the Wool Company.

The country's seventh and newest milk processing company starts producing powder on Saturday, but is already talking of expansion.

Farmers hate to think someone is getting one over them, so it should come as little surprise that Craig Norgate's offer to buy half of Silver Fern Farms for $220 million has been greeted with a fair degree of suspicion.

An 11% decline in sheep numbers nationally in the last year would exceed all predictions.

Last week's science funding allocation sent a thinly concealed warning to sheep and beef farmers about the need to contribute funds to research.

Meat and Wool New Zealand invested more than 40% of the levies it collected last year in research and development.

Dairy farmers are being warned the Otago Regional Council is taking a tougher stance this year on breaches of effluent compliance rules.