Outlook with Bill Webb Bill Webb Feed Solutions

 The weather has been wet and dry, and the economic outlook is both good and bad – how’s that for confusing.

Even though we seem to be getting some wet weather, the water tables are still down. We're still in a deficit from way back and it’s still showing.

Some areas were struggling to grow grass until we had this recent northerly rain, as the grass doesn’t grow too well in the colder westerly rain that we had before. We need the north easterly rain to warm soil temperatures up.

Average temperatures have been similar to this time last year, but the soil temperature is lower.

Some people are quite tight for feed, but things will change shortly with warmer rain on the way.

There was 111mm of rain in August last year, and only 44mm this August – we were more than 50 per cent down. The slower grass growth in August reflects this.

But we are making up for it in September – we had only 34mm in September last year, compared to 112mm for September 2020 to-date.

Overall, we’ve had more rain this year from August 1 to September 23 – we had 145mm last year and

160mm in 2021.

We’re spraying about 10 days later this year because of the weather and slow grass growth. If the weather plays ball, we’ll be planting in 10-15 days. It’s a funny ol’ season.

Talking ship

At the time of writing this, Auckland has recently moved from Alert Level Four to Alert Level Three.

This lockdown is going to have another impact on deliveries and services as most things come out of Auckland – if you thought we had long wait times before, it’s probably only going to get worse.

After the last lockdown purchasing was at an all-time high and nobody expected it – hence the high shipping costs we are paying now because there aren’t enough containers to keep up with demand.

International shipping company Maersk has announced they have ordered eight new vessels that will be released from 2022-2024 to meet demand. And, they will be carbon neutral ships, running on carbon-neutral methanol.

Signs of the times

Speaking of being carbon neutral, a new oat milk advocate is on the scene. He says his alternative milk is the way of the future because it sucks carbon from the air, nitrogen from the soil and doesn’t burp, fart or urinate. So there you go: oat milk, watch out for it.

Also, machinery manufacturer Vermeer has developed an automated robotic bale collector that carries about three bales at a time and transports them to a stack site for you. It's just goes to show that things are forever evolving in farming.

The dairy payout is showing quite a range. Fonterra are forecasting between $7.25 and $8.75, and the banks are saying $7.70 and $8.30. Either way, it’s looking likely that the payout will have an eight at the front of it, which is great news for the farmers.

Even though costs have gone up dramatically this year, the farmers are still able to make a profit. There was a great uptake of maize this year, which was a pleasant surprise.

In saying that, you need around $6.50 payout at the moment just to break even, so it’s lucky that profits are high.

The beef farmers are having a good run, too, partly because there are currently restrictions on beef exports from Argentina to China, which is creating more demand from China for New Zealand beef.

China also want to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Who knows if it will happen, but it will be good news for New Zealand if it does.

Farmgate prices are about $6.35 at the moment compared to $5.75 last year. Lamb is also having record high prices. All in all, agriculture is doing very well at the present time.

Incoming regulations

Currently councils are working on getting Three Waters sorted, as well as winter grazing solutions going forward.

As part of winter grazing regulations, the government is talking about a maximum slope of 10 degrees for growing forage crops on as a blanket rule for the whole country.

Not a lot of land around here would fall within that, other than the flat land. The irony is that the flat lowlands are the worst for pugging in the winter time, but they will be the only places we’ll be allowed to grow.

It’s all a lot to keep up with, but I encourage farmers to meet with their local MP, councillor, community board member or Federated Farmers representative to help keep ahead of it.

We still have a good supply of milking quality silage bales and have some maize silage available. We are taking orders for next season, so get your orders in now.