More than two dozen farmers from Taranaki and Waikato got a taste of Mid and South Canterbury’s burgeoning robotic farming industry last week.
ANZ commercial and agriculture managing director Graham Turley said the bank arranged the event to give its North Island clients an idea of the changing approaches to farming in the South Island.
«It’s not going to be for every farm, and the technology used at many of the places we visited is brand new … but the purpose was to connect our customers in the north with those in the south,» Mr Turley said.
«The dairy farms in the South Island tend to have much larger herd sizes, this has led to more farms using robots to carry out their operations more efficiently. It hasn’t really happened in the North Island yet.»
The tour party visited Pannetts Dairies (Mitcham, Mid Canterbury), Turley Farms (Temuka), Camelot Robotic Dairy Farm (Ashburton), and Riverholme Robotic Dairy Farm (Pleasant Point).
«All of these farms are at the cutting edge of technology … these are major investments they’re taking on.»
Mr Turley said the robots at the Riverholme and Camelot farms could milk up to 60 cows a day. Both of those farms hoped to install at least two or three robots on their sites.
«It eliminates some of the human side of milking, while these robots can also record a lot of data about the cows’ output,» Mr Turley said.
«However, at the end of the day, you still need people on the farm to assist with the management and overseeing of the practices, as the robots become more common, farm workers have to develop new skills, and become more sophisticated.»
According to the most recent DairyNZ estimates, South Canterbury farms have an average herd size of about 780 cows – more than twice the size of the average Waikato (321) or Taranaki (281) dairy farm.
Mr Turley said Canterbury dairy farmers had to find new ways to increase their productivity while also working within the tighter rules under the regional council’s land and water plan. The Taranaki and Waikato farmers were also interested to see how irrigation had changed the Canterbury economy, he said.
«It brings a lot of diversity that wouldn’t otherwise have existed.»
Turley Farms in Temuka was the only non-dairy farm visited as part of the two-day trip. However, Mr Turley said it was chosen as a visit site due to its use of new technologies such as digital mapping and its involvement with the South Canterbury-based co-operative Seedlands.
Source:Stuff