Beef + Lamb New Zealand is having another crack at increasing its directors' fees after cash-strapped farmers voted down an increase last year.
An independent panel has recommended an increase of 6%, after considering the workload of directors and benchmarking against similar organisations, but directors decided to propose a 4% increase for farmers to vote on.
That would mean the director fees pool would increase from $401,500 to $417,500 a year which represents a fee increase for the chairperson to $83,320 from $76,220 and for each director to $39,250 from $38,110.
A note on the resolution said the proposed 4% movement would move the director fees to 68% in the benchmarked range, which was lower than the 75% position in range recommended by the Director Independent Remuneration Committee (DIRC).
Director fees were last increased at the 2022 annual meeting by 3%. In 2023, the DIRC reviewed and recommended a fee movement of 9% for the chairperson and for directors respectively and an increase of 11% for the unallocated director fee pool. That was not supported by farmers at last year’s annual meeting, 976 farmers, or 65.7%, voting against.
Voting closes on March 19 and the annual meeting will be on March 26.
