Trade Minister Todd McClay is traveling to Indonesia today to join the Prime Minister and a high-level business delegation for a two-day official visit.
“Indonesia is an important trade partner for New Zealand, and as our 11th largest export market offers significant trading opportunities.
“Our two-way trade currently sits at $1.6 billion, and we're keen to explore ways to meet the target set by the two countries last year to boost trade to $4 billion by 2024,” says Mr McClay.
“We will be looking to further broaden our trade connections, including through the Prime Minister’s meeting with Indonesian President Joko Widodo and my own meeting with Indonesian Trade Minister Thomas Lembong.”
Mr McClay spoke with Minster Lembong at last weekend’s G20 meeting in Shanghai and both ministers committed to further develop their government-to-government and business-to-business links.
"With a population of 255 million, Indonesia offers significant opportunity to New Zealand exporters and we will be looking to capitalise on the Prime Minister's visit to open doors for New Zealand companies," says Mr McClay.
While in Indonesia, Mr McClay will take part in business forums in Jakarta and Surabaya. The Jakarta business forum will focus on the benefits of regional economic integration, including between ASEAN and New Zealand. The Surabaya business forum will aim to promote New Zealand’s economic relationship with East Java, Indonesia’s second most populous province.
“I look forward to working alongside the New Zealand business delegation to showcase New Zealand’s commercial expertise in areas of priority for Indonesia, including renewable energy, food and beverage, aviation, education and tourism,” says Mr McClay.
Source: Minister of Trade Todd McClay July 17, 2016
World War I saw the first use of aircraft in large-scale conflicts and the battlefield has never been the same since. These early airplanes used rotary engines, in which the crankshaft remains stationary while the rest of engine rotates around it.
You won’t see many original WWI aircraft engines still in use today, but if you happen to visit a small machine shop in New Zealand, you can order a brand-new one. In addition to making parts for vintage aircraft and general machining services, Classic Aero Machining Service is building 1915 Gnome engines using modern manufacturing techniques. “Our idea was to produce original rotary engines which were safe, reliable and affordable,” said Tony Wytenburg, chief engineer and managing director of Classic Aero Machining Service. “I’ve been in business since 2004; I can’t say I enjoy everything about running a small business, but I do take great satisfaction from making parts. Being able to make a lot of parts which, when finished, is a running engine is one of the most satisfying things I’ve ever done.”
Pictured to the right is a a brand-new Gnome rotary engine courtesy of Classic Aero Machining Serivce.
Read the full article here by ENGINEERING.com who had the chance to get Wytenburg’s insights on this unique project - July 15, 2016
International packaging company Orora Limited has invested more than $25 million to support its growing New Zealand customer base and increase its manufacturing capabilities. The company has key manufacturing operations in Christchurch, Hastings and Auckland and has made significant investments at each site.
“The New Zealand market is core to Orora’s Australasian business growth strategy as is evidenced by our ongoing financial commitment to our Orora Kiwi Packaging operations,” Orora Limited CEO and Managing Director Nigel Garrard said.
“Our investment in a new state of the art Flexo Folder Gluer (FFG) - a complete box making solution that increases capacity, print capability and print quality - in our Christchurch facility, reinforces our strong business confidence in the New Zealand South Island as it rebuilds following the earthquakes that severely impacted the region,” Mr Garrard said.
Investment in Orora’s Hastings operations has helped to increase production capacity and reduce repetitive handling processes to meet future demand for the company’s valued kiwi fruit, meat and apple customers. Orora’s investment includes a new FFG, a Rotary die-cutter to increase the sites capacity, along with a new automation solution for its latest die-cutter. The company has also created 40 new jobs in the Hawkes Bay area as it continues to invest in regional business areas.
Orora has also recently approved further capital investment in its Auckland Operations for a new generation FFG, and a new materials handling system to add to its automation investment to reduce repetitive handling. This adds to its recent investment in a state of the art high quality printer to meet the current and future requirements of its valued customers in the region.
Orora is a leading supplier of packaging products. In New Zealand, Orora delivers fibre packaging through its corrugated packaging business, Orora Kiwi Packaging.
Source:
Modern bikes are lighter and more efficient than ever before, but their basic design is rooted in the past.
Cyclotron is trying to change that with a hubless carbon creation, complete with lighting fit for a sci-fi film. It's not just a different look for the sake of it, though, with Cyclotron saying its bike is versatile and smart enough to revolutionize what we expect from the humble two-wheeler.
In this article published recently on GizMag the story behind this futuristic design unfolds. There's a lot going on with the Cyclotron's frame, but we're going to start with the basic construction. The team behind the bike says the bike's space-grade carbon sandwich is wrapped around a lightweight core structure, allowing them to use fewer layers of carbon and less resin without impacting on the overall strength and rigidity.
The shape itself is faintly reminiscent of current time-trial bikes, albeit blockier, although the company is adamant it's been modeled on the aerodynamic form of ultralight gliders and stealth jets. Unlike your average stealth bomber, this frame can be customized with decals if you want.
Whether it's a two-wheeled Blackbird or not, there are a few other benefits to the frame design. While some manufacturers hide their cabling inside the frame, the derailleur and chain are usually exposed. That's not the case here, with the drivetrain fully enclosed and protected from the elements, although we're not sure how that setup will go when it comes time for the annual service suggested by the company.
Ditching the spokes and running with solid polymer airless tires might make for a unique design, but it also frees up some space where the spokes used to be. Cyclotron wants to use that space for cargo or children, making its bike more practical than it would otherwise be. At the moment, there are three accessories available for those utility slots, including shopping baskets and a clever snap-in child seat.
In keeping with the futuristic frame design, there's a futuristic powertrain available for this sci-fi bike. As well as more traditional 12- and 18-speed manual setups, there's a electronic sequential gearbox available. Shifting in less than 0.2 seconds, the gearbox works at standstill or under full load and can shift for itself. Electric gearbox-equipped bikes will weigh just 11.6 kg (25.57 lb), making them 100 g (3.5 oz) heavier than the manual 12-speed version, but 200 g (7 oz) lighter than the 18-speed manual.
Enough of the boring practical bits, what the story with those lights? When darkness falls, a sensor automatically activates the LED wheel halos and laser-lane display, in an attempt to make the rider easy to see on unlit streets in the dead of night. We'd say it works, too, with those Tron-style wheels being hard to miss. Power comes from an integrated lithium-ion battery good for eight hours that is charged by an inbuilt dynamo, although the battery can be charged from a wall socket as well.
Continue reading and view the video here
Modern bikes are lighter and more efficient than ever before, but their basic design is rooted in the past.
Cyclotron is trying to change that with a hubless carbon creation, complete with lighting fit for a sci-fi film. It's not just a different look for the sake of it, though, with Cyclotron saying its bike is versatile and smart enough to revolutionize what we expect from the humble two-wheeler.
In this article published recently on GizMag the story behind this futuristic design unfolds. There's a lot going on with the Cyclotron's frame, but we're going to start with the basic construction. The team behind the bike says the bike's space-grade carbon sandwich is wrapped around a lightweight core structure, allowing them to use fewer layers of carbon and less resin without impacting on the overall strength and rigidity.
The shape itself is faintly reminiscent of current time-trial bikes, albeit blockier, although the company is adamant it's been modeled on the aerodynamic form of ultralight gliders and stealth jets. Unlike your average stealth bomber, this frame can be customized with decals if you want.
Whether it's a two-wheeled Blackbird or not, there are a few other benefits to the frame design. While some manufacturers hide their cabling inside the frame, the derailleur and chain are usually exposed. That's not the case here, with the drivetrain fully enclosed and protected from the elements, although we're not sure how that setup will go when it comes time for the annual service suggested by the company.
Ditching the spokes and running with solid polymer airless tires might make for a unique design, but it also frees up some space where the spokes used to be. Cyclotron wants to use that space for cargo or children, making its bike more practical than it would otherwise be. At the moment, there are three accessories available for those utility slots, including shopping baskets and a clever snap-in child seat.
In keeping with the futuristic frame design, there's a futuristic powertrain available for this sci-fi bike. As well as more traditional 12- and 18-speed manual setups, there's a electronic sequential gearbox available. Shifting in less than 0.2 seconds, the gearbox works at standstill or under full load and can shift for itself. Electric gearbox-equipped bikes will weigh just 11.6 kg (25.57 lb), making them 100 g (3.5 oz) heavier than the manual 12-speed version, but 200 g (7 oz) lighter than the 18-speed manual.
Enough of the boring practical bits, what the story with those lights? When darkness falls, a sensor automatically activates the LED wheel halos and laser-lane display, in an attempt to make the rider easy to see on unlit streets in the dead of night. We'd say it works, too, with those Tron-style wheels being hard to miss. Power comes from an integrated lithium-ion battery good for eight hours that is charged by an inbuilt dynamo, although the battery can be charged from a wall socket as well.
Continue reading and view the video here
Maersk Line is upgrading its ‘Triple Star’ service by launching direct, weekly northbound connections between New Zealand and North East Asian ports.
"We are optimising our ‘Triple Star’ service with the launch of direct, weekly connections between New Zealand and North East Asian ports. Starting from late September 2016, Kiwi exporters can enjoy all the benefits of direct access to Taiwan, China, Korea and Japan," says a statement from Maersk Line.
With unmatched transit times to a number of strategic ports, this superior service has been tailormade to offer New Zealand businesses fast and reliable access to these important markets.
Connections to the Triple Star Service from Nelson, Wellington, Timaru and Napier will be offered via our Northern Star service - soon adding a Tauranga call, says the company.
Source: MaritimeToday
We have in New Zealand a problem that can strike small packaging companies. Where they can be running several blown film lines and just not have the money to put a gauge on each line. But they still need to see what they are making, especially when expensive co-extrusions are being made. Between a rock and a hard place stuff really!
Now NDC Technologies make a transmission gauge for measuring various co-extrusions on-line to reference accuracy. These gauges usually sit on scanning frames and control the films as they are being made. Now the problem with a lot of blown film lines is doubling the measurement at the lay flat or paying a fortune for a rotary scanner on the bubble. But a customer wanted to measure all his lines with one gauge at-line rather than on-line.
So I saw David Aucamp at Innopak in Auckland to design and make a mechanism that would scan a strip of sample. An operator simply cuts a strip from the film and puts it on the winder. This scans the strip and gives a full running analysis of the co-extrusions. This data is kept as a record and the operator can adjust the die bolts to correct any unders or overs. One centrally placed winding system is far less to buy than a gauge system on each line. Innopak make the scanning frame. This gauge system works brilliantly and is now well proven
If you are a blown film packaging manufacturer this level of control opens things out significantly for you because you can now confidently make products that previously you would probably never have attempted. You can set the lines up to make products automatically the way your customers customers want them. And that gives you a quick return on investment. The ability to control what you make is paramount and really does have a positive effect on the bottom line.
If the above applies to you then please don’t hesitate to come through to me. You can reach me on 09 428 3426 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and the other part of the solution; I do have finance options available for you to consider that can help make the whole exercise a positive one.
From Simon Ganley of Ganley Engineering
Friendship with Sir David Attenborough seen as big plus for car-buff presenter
Napier, MSCNewsWire, Friday 15 July 2016 - Paul Henry’s mysterious mid-winter holiday is increasingly being ascribed to the television showman’s candidacy for the BBC’s most valuable property which is the motor series Top Gear.
Mr Henry (pictured above) is known to have been considered for the anchor role when it originally became vacant when defining presenter Jeremy Clarkson made his departure.
Since then the show has floundered, notably during the term as presenter of a well-known British disc jockey and is now often referred to as Top Flop.
The BBC has too much invested in the series to abandon it. Recent experiences have convinced the corporation that it is the character and performance of the main presenter that determines its success or otherwise.
A key asset for car-buff Mr Henry is his long ago association with the BBC’s Sir David Attenborough. In addition to his role as natural history presenter Sir David (pictured below) who is now 90 has occupied most of the BBC’s senior administrative roles including director of programming and controller.
Mr Henry whose family comes from Britain’s West Country worked early in his career at the BBC with Sir David.
Mr Henry has spent most of his working life in New Zealand however and his neutral accent is considered an advantage in the BBC, as are his relatively humble origins.
A problem confronting his candidacy though will be his exuberant delivery of seemingly spontaneous one-liners that conflict with the BBC’s twin underpinning doctrines of diversity and multiculturalism.
Mr Henry’s unsuccessful candidature as National Party (Conservative) Member of Parliament for the Wairarapa electorate would now not be considered a drawback for a top role at the BBC.
This is because of the sudden and overwhelmingly current vogue in the United Kingdom for authority figures who are not from a ruling class background, especially a public (i.e. private) school one, or an ivy league university one.
Mr Henry with his active New Zealand and Australia broadcasting career would also fill a generalised quota often jestingly referred to within the BBC as a colonial one.
His anchor role on his independent television eponymous breakfast show has been taken up temporarily by the be-whiskered Mark Sainsbury.
Mr Sainsbury has given the impression of being deliberately vague on the matter of the precise date of Mr Henry’s return to the popular early morning independent television show.
It is here that Mr Henry’s natural everyman style of exuberance sometimes bordering on bluster, and his absence of feigned political correctness is considered a strength by both audience and advertisers.
From the MSCNewsWire reporters' deskThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
High Pressure Processing (HPP) equipment manufacturers for the food industry are experiencing a growing demand for their equipment and technology as we move through 2016. A prominent HPP equipment manufacturer who is represented here in New Zealand is Hiperbaric.
Auckland, 21 April 2016 - HPP is a preservative technology which does not involves heat and is applied to already-packed products, any possible recontamination that may occur during packing will be controlled. With the growing popularity and demand of raw, natural and additive free products, the global food industry is facing fundamental changes to conquer a customer that is becoming more and more informed and exigent by the day.
In a recent edition of the New Zealand Food Technology magazine an excellent article appeared tracing the development of nonthermal processing technologies. It is repeated here or you can read it in the New Zealand Food Technology Magazine:
It was 1898 when B H Hite, a chemist from West Virginia, introduced milk in a manual press he had made for achieving high hydrostatic pressures; he realised that milk lasted longer after doing so. Pressure has killed the spoilage bugs, he thought and he was right.
Almost at the same time and following Becquerel’s discovery of radioactivity in 1895, first research on the use of ionising energy to destroy microbes in food was published in a German medical journal. In the late 1940s, B L Flaumenbaum observed in his lab in Germany that fruit subjected to quick pulsed electricity saw their permeability increased, and microbes were inactivated.
Over a century after these initial discoveries and thanks to the evolution of designs and materials, we are seeing that these old solutions have, finally, become available to the food industry in a profitable way. The first method is now known as High Pressure Processing (HPP); the third, as Pulsed Electric Fields (PEF); the second, food irradiation, had an earlier adoption (it was firstly approved in the United States in 1986 and irradiated foods started to be commercialised in the 1990s).
In the last few years other technological advances have appeared in the food manufacturing space. With ultrasound, food manufacturers can take advantage of the cavitation generated by sound waves passing through the food and breaking the cell membranes of bacteria. Cold plasma, the most recent development in the sector, is still in the experimental phase. Plasma, aka the ‘fourth state’ of matter, is obtained applying extremely high energies to a gas, creating a gliding arc of ionised, nonthermal plasma that is able to sterilise the surface of foods.
These new techniques fit well in schemes pursued by food manufacturers, such as the hurdle concept and the minimal processing scheme which, respectively, promise food safety through putting barriers to the presence and growth of bugs along the food processing chain, and nutrition, functionality and retention of freshness in case of the latter minimal, gentle processing. Something else is shared by irradiation, high pressure processing, pulsed electric fields, or plasma treatment: they are all nonthermal technologies, meaning they don’t involve heating. These processes are applied to the food usually in chilled or ambient temperature condition so the components can stay fresh.
Heating the food is the traditional way of preserving foodstuffs and getting rid of undesirable spoilage microorganisms and pathogens. It is a great and effective way for obtaining safe products that last longer in our fridge or on the shelves. But it tends to flatten flavours and colours, and to harm the functionality and nutrition of the fresh, destroying for example vitamins or antioxidants. Additives and preservatives are the second common tool for making foods stable and safer, but consumers don’t want to see them on the labels. Overall, consumer demand is generating the need for new processing solutions and meals that are fresher, more natural, minimally processed, and with no artificial ingredients. These are precisely the most complicated to handle in the factory from the perspective of food safety and preservation, and this is why new hurdles and solutions are being implemented.
HPP systems are probably the highest growth category, with foods worth more than 750,000 Tons of product being processed annually, according to Hiperbaric, S.A., Burgos, Spain, a leading manufacturer of these industrial installations. The technique basically consists in applying pressures around 6,000 bar (6,000 atmospheres or 87,000 psi) to food during three to five minutes. Imagine submerging your bottle of fresh juice or your luncheon meat in the bottom of an ocean that was 60Km deep – 6 times more than the depth of the Mariana Trench, and that’s what high pressure processing is about. The microbes are destroyed but the food stays intact because pressure is isostatic, transmitted by water, and then equal from all sides.
HPP has seen spectacular growth over the past decade, and is projected to become one of the key factors of the new food industry and the most promising emerging technique, according to a Campden BRI (UK) study published in the journal Innovative Food Science and Emerging Technologies this year.
According to Hiperbaric, Cold Pressure Tecnology or HPP (High Pressure Processing) is becoming more mainstream in certain food spaces outside the traditional ones (mainly guacamole, continental meats, lobsters, to name a few), and two particular segments are now driving its growth: cold pressed juices, and HPP Tolling.
In the past three years, the cold pressed juice category has experienced explosive growth with well known names such as Suja, Evolution Fresh, Blueprint, Coldpress, Harmless Harvest etc. All of them are Hiperbaric customers. The Spanish company is growing this year to a turnover of more than 70m and has an order backlog for 2016 that indicates it might surpass 100m in 2016.
The second segment in which HPP technology is becoming more widely implemented is the Tolling/Copacking business model, in which contract service companies, refrigerated service suppliers and logistic platforms are adding Hiperbaric lines as a way to add value to their services. Using the network of toll HPP services, any food maker with a need for a pathogen lethality intervention, a extension of the product shelf life, or access to export markets, can access high pressure technology and pay on a per Kg, per pack or per batch basis, without the need of investing in its own Hiperbaric system.
In Australia and New Zealand, currently a total of 14 HPP systems are operating in most of the different segments including meat, shellfish, juices, nut milk, guacamole, RTE meals etc.
From laboratory to final industrial practice, gentle physical processes are helping the food industry in the making of hopefully safer, better eats and displacing chemicals from our diets. If evolution continues as expected and the price of these systems is progressively brought down, we will increasingly see pressurised meals and cold plasma hygienised dinners on our table.
For more information contact:
Scanz Technologies Ltd.This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.Phone: 09 520 2544
Friendship with Sir David Attenborough seen as big plus for car-buff presenter
Paul Henry’s mysterious mid-winter holiday is increasingly being ascribed to the television showman’s candidacy for the BBC’s most valuable property which is the motor series Top Gear.
Mr Henry (pictured above) is known to have been considered for the anchor role when it originally became vacant when defining presenter Jeremy Clarkson made his departure.
Since then the show has floundered, notably during the term as presenter of a well-known British disc jockey and is now often referred to as Top Flop.
The BBC has too much invested in the series to abandon it. Recent experiences have convinced the corporation that it is the character and performance of the main presenter that determines its success or otherwise.
A key asset for car-buff Mr Henry is his long ago association with the BBC’s Sir David Attenborough. In addition to his role as natural history presenter Sir David (pictured below) who is now 90 has occupied most of the BBC’s senior administrative roles including director of programming and controller.
Mr Henry whose family comes from Britain’s West Country worked early in his career at the BBC with Sir David.
Mr Henry has spent most of his working life in New Zealand however and his neutral accent is considered an advantage in the BBC, as are his relatively humble origins.
A problem confronting his candidacy though will be his exuberant delivery of seemingly spontaneous one-liners that conflict with the BBC’s twin underpinning doctrines of diversity and multiculturalism.
Mr Henry’s unsuccessful candidature as National Party (Conservative) Member of Parliament for the Wairarapa electorate would now not be considered a drawback for a top role at the BBC.
This is because of the sudden and overwhelmingly current vogue in the United Kingdom for authority figures who are not from a ruling class background, especially a public (i.e. private) school one, or an ivy league university one.
Mr Henry with his active New Zealand and Australia broadcasting career would also fill a generalised quota often jestingly referred to within the BBC as a colonial one.
His anchor role on his independent television eponymous breakfast show has been taken up temporarily by the be-whiskered Mark Sainsbury.
Mr Sainsbury has given the impression of being deliberately vague on the matter of the precise date of Mr Henry’s return to the popular early morning independent television show.
It is here that Mr Henry’s natural everyman style of exuberance sometimes bordering on bluster, and his absence of feigned political correctness is considered a strength by both audience and advertisers.
From the MSCNewsWire reporters' desk, Friday 15 July 2016This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Palace of the Alhambra, Spain
By: Charles Nathaniel Worsley (1862-1923)
From the collection of Sir Heaton Rhodes
Oil on canvas - 118cm x 162cm
Valued $12,000 - $18,000
Offers invited over $9,000
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242
Mount Egmont with Lake
By: John Philemon Backhouse (1845-1908)
Oil on Sea Shell - 13cm x 14cm
Valued $2,000-$3,000
Offers invited over $1,500
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242