Tahr cull an overreaction
DOC’s proposal to kill 17,500 Himalayan tahr over the next 10 months is rushed, based on slender evidence, and could spell the demise of a unique and valuable trophy herd, says NZ Deerstalkers’ Association spokesman Bill O’Leary.
“The numbers they want to start killing within the next fortnight have been set without a proper assessment of the situation, and there is no attempt to leave the most valuable animals – the bull tahr that can take eight years to reach their trophy potential,” says Bill.
“More time needs to be spent setting terms and conditions for the cull rather than just rushing in and killing everything on sight without considering the consequences.
“DOC’s population estimate of 35,600 animals was largely based on controversial methods of assessing the numbers by pellet counts.
The association acknowledges tahr numbers are above the level set in the 1993 Thar Plan, and some carefully planned, highly selective culling needs to be done – but say better data and more detailed planning are needed rather than killing so many tahr with undue haste.
A herd of 10,000 tahr left after unselective culling would not be able to provide a sustainable harvest of trophies.
“At that level there would be about 5000 male tahr left, of which only a fraction would be mature animals.
“Hunters take over 3000 a year – well over half of the available males including young as well as mature animals.
“At that rate the trophy value of the herd would vanish within a couple of years.”
The challenges confronting the red meat sector, particularly in terms of environmental compliance and alternative synthetic meats and proteins in the market place, are as big as many farmers will see in their lifetime.
These challenges have highlighted the opportunities, Beef +Lamb NZ has recognised that our sector needs to quickly re-position itself to take advantage of the opportunities in telling the New Zealand story regarding our environmentally sustainable free-range grass-fed systems.
It’s vitally important B+LNZ have resources to assist farmers into a new era.
Just recently B+LNZ have gone to their farmers and asked them to vote on a levy increase. I personally believe the proposal to increase the levy is an investment in our future.
The future for the drystock industry is exciting.
There is a huge opportunity for farmers to grow their wealth by recognising the natural capital stocks on their farms particularly around redesigning farm systems to optimise land use thus improving their profitability while farming within environmental limits determined by their soil types and landscapes.
Also, the opportunities around the value of their ecosystem services, biodiversity and carbon. the
Last month B+LNZ announced an increase in to the sheep and beef levies, Quote: “Beef + Lamb New Zealand’s Board has decided to proceed with the proposed increase in the sheepmeat and beef levies following significant support from farmers.”
From October 1 the levy for sheepmeat will increase 10 cents, to 70 cents per head, and the beef levy by 80 cents, to $5.20 per head. This is 0.4 per cent of the average slaughter value for prime steer/heifer, 0.7 per cent cull dairy cow, 0.7 per cent of lamb, and 1.1 per cent of mutton over the last three years.
The additional levies will be invested in accelerating four key programmes: the international activation of the Taste Pure Nature origin brand and the Red Meat Story, helping the sector lift its environmental performance and reputation, telling the farmer story better and strengthening B+LNZ’s capability to address biosecurity risks.
Andrew Morrison, B+LNZ chairman, says there was clear support for the proposal with almost 63 per cent of respondents backing an increase.
”We were pleased by the level of interest in the proposal and the amount of detail we received in the submission forms. Outside of a statutory referendum vote, our five-week consultation generated the highest level of engagement for B +LNZ ever and this demonstrates how passionate our farmers are about the sector’s prosperity.
“There were also similar levels of support from sheep, cattle and dairy farmers. This is particularly pleasing as B+LNZ takes its responsibilities towards all levy payers extremely seriously.
“Almost two thirds of respondents (64 per cent) indicated support for the strategic direction of B+LNZ, which is an encouraging message from our farmers,” he says.
“Feedback from farmers showed widespread support for the Taste Pure Nature origin brand and the organisation’s new environment strategy.
“However, farmers also encouraged B+LNZ to work collaboratively across the sector to ensure there wasn’t a duplication of effort.”
While many farmers endorsed the additional investment proposed by B+LNZ noting the small percentage of overall animal sale value, others indicated that they were concerned about potential cost pressures for the sector too.
“We’re aware that for some farmers their costs are increasing and that there is uncertainty around the impacts of Mycoplasma bovis and what their share of the phased eradication cost will be,” says Andrew.
“In making this decision, we’ve considered farmer’s concerns carefully.
“Even though we had a clear mandate from the 2015 referendum to increase levies, we committed to coming back to farmers to ensure they backed the direction we were heading in.
“We’ve listened to the valuable feedback that farmers have given us and we’ll be working hard to ensure that the results of this additional investment will deliver benefits for our industry.”
To implement the levy increase, B+LNZ will be gazetting the change in September, informing meat processing companies of the rise, and advertising the change to farmers over the coming weeks.
A total of 1881 farmers lodged postal and online submissions during the consultation process, which ran from June 5 to July 13 and around 1000 farmers attended face to face discussions of the proposal.
Rick Burke is also chairman of Farmers For Positive Change.