Beef + Lamb New Zealand chairman Mike Petersen says this year’s style of meeting is a bit different and the aim is to make the organisation available to as many sheep and beef farmers as possible on their home turf.

“This time round, we’re holding more informal meetings that are designed to be shorter and easier for farmers to attend – no more than an hour long.

Mr Petersen said since last year’s referendum the organisation had reorganised itself through a regionalised structure, designed to make a greater connection with farmers.

“Specialist Beef + Lamb New Zealand extension managers are now working closely with the organisation’s farmer Directors and the Sheep and Beef Councils, whose role has been strengthened to ensure the right priorities are progressed.

“At these updates we’ll talk about the tools and services that the organisation has in the toolbox, and we also want feedback from farmers on the kinds of activities they want their levy investment to fund.”

Mr Petersen said with the regionalised focus, farmers will have a greater say in the kinds of extension activities that will be run in their areas and the farmer update meetings are a forum to get this dialogue started.

“We’ll be assuring farmers that we will fund research programmes that are prioritised by them and modelled by the Beef + Lamb New Zealand Economic Service to ensure they will deliver significant gains to achieve better outcomes.

“We’re going to have much more focus on extension and ensure that the outcomes of research are taken up by farmers. And our objective of 3 per cent productivity gains will be assessed using the Economic Service database, which is a statistically representative sample of the farming industry. The benchmark will be based from the 2009/10 year.”

The first of the Beef + Lamb New Zealand farmer update meetings start in Hawkes Bay on Tuesday 27 July (John Speakman’s Woolshed, Edenham Station, Atua Rd, Elsthorpe at 1 pm and at 3 pm in Chris and Jennifer Chesterman’s Woolshed, Koanui, Maraetotara Rd, Maraetotara). The meetings run through until the end of August. A full list of the meetings, dates and venues is on the Beef + Lamb New Zealand Ltd website www.beeflambnz.com and they are also included in last week’s mailout to sheep and beef farmers.