The new John Deere 4640 Universal Display raises the bar for performance, uptime and cost of operation as part of the latest John Deere Generation 4 Operating System. For customers, this translates into better data collection, increased application functionality, and greater choice for monitoring and managing many tractor-driven field operations.

The new 4640 Universal Display enables customers to use the most common and popular John Deere applications, including AutoTrac™, documentation, and Section Control, in a portable display that has the latest internal components, design and user interface.

"The new 4640 Universal Display provides a transportable, easy-to-operate solution for customers with the John Deere Generation 4 operating system," says John Mishler, production and precision ag marketing manager for John Deere. "Some enhancements built into the display include more on-screen help and diagnostic information to keep operators running and informed of their display capabilities; simplified Work Setup app with page-by-page navigation; and greater user customization of run pages."

When it comes to performance, the 4640 Universal Display provides improved documentation for high-speed planting and nutrient applications, coupled with the latest data syncing functionalities for increased on-board/off-board flexibility. Additional enhancements include the ability to more accurately map and operate Section Control to precisely apply multiple products simultaneously with individual coverage maps and application points.

The display is designed to import new customer and product information without the risk of overwriting existing client/farm/field and guidance line information. It also has an expanded suite of Precision Ag Core applications, including AutoTrac, Section Control and documentation, as well as wireless data transfer (WDT) with the “data sync” feature for automatic transmission of work documentation to the John Deere Operations Center.

The time it takes operators to set up and start up the display has been reduced and display navigation has been improved. This equates to more uptime for the user, as a quickly learnable display results in reduced training time, more time working, and fewer operator mistakes.

Cost of operation also is lower with the 4640 Display. Improved Gen 4 applications such as AutoTrac, Section Control, and documentation increase customer profitability by helping users work more efficiently, reduce overlap and skips, and maximize inputs and field operations. Combined with Gen 4 Section Control, operators can optimize field performance using distance and speed-based turning with the ability to dial in more quickly and accurately the desired settings.

In addition, a power button has been added to the back of the 4640 Display so operators can shut the display off or reboot without powering down the tractor. The display is compatible with the Gen 4 Extended Monitor, which increases the number of run pages visible to the operator, giving easier access to more operation information.

Mishler adds that precision ag software for the display is available as either one- or five-year subscription durations and in two levels, either AutoTrac only or as Precision Ag Core that includes not only AutoTrac but also documentation and Section Control. This gives customers the flexibility to match the right software subscription level and duration to their needs.

"John Deere is the only supplier to offer machine-based precision ag subscriptions that allow customers to select the software they want and the duration of the subscription," he explains. "This gives customers a lower cost of entry into these precision ag applications and the ability to try new applications without having to buy permanent software licenses."

The 4640 Universal Display is available to order now. It is compatible with John Deere 30-Series to the latest 6R, 7R, 8R and 9R Series Tractors, as well as AutoTrac Universal and AutoTrac Controller compatible competitive tractors. Software update 17-2 is required for functionality. Precision ag application compatibility for implements and controllers, and for general applications, is limited to the latest Gen 4 OS software available.

For more information on the new 4640 Universal Display, see your local John Deere dealer or visit JohnDeere.com/ag. or   johndeere.co.nz

| A John Deere  release   ||  June 9,  2017   |||

Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits (“Southern Glazer’s”) — the largest North American wine and spirits distribution company — today announced that it is expanding its existing distribution agreements with Delegat, a leading global super premium wine company. With the new agreements, Southern Glazer’s will be distributing Delegat brands in 15 additional markets. As a result, Southern Glazer’s will be Delegat’s exclusive distributor partner in a total of 32 U.S. market.

In addition to the 17 markets that were already represented by Southern Glazer’s, Delegat is adding Arizona, Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, South Carolina, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, and Washington D.C.

“We are excited to extend our business relationship and represent Delegat’s world-class super premium wines across our unmatched national network,” said Mel Dick, Senior Vice President of Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits and President of the Company’s Wine Division. “This significantly expanded relationship further enhances our world-class wine business and enables us to introduce these great wine brands to a broader base of Southern Glazer’s customers.”

“Delegat’s Oyster Bay and Barossa Valley Estate wines are poised for growth in light of strong consumer demand for super premium brands,” added Steve Slater Executive Vice President and General Manager of the Company’s Corporate Wine Division. “Leveraging this trend, and with our new national alignment, we are confident that we can accelerate Delegat’s presence within Southern Glazer’s key national account customer base.”

“Delegat USA has worked very successfully with Southern Glazer’s over the past decade to achieve strong growth with our category leading brands Oyster Bay and Barossa Valley Estate,” said Graeme Lord, Managing Director of Delegat Group Limited. “Extending our relationship with Southern Glazer’s will provide a powerful distribution platform across 32 markets in the United States. We are looking forward to working with Southern Glazer’s to serve our customers, grow distribution and realize the significant growth potential of Oyster Bay and Barossa Valley Estate.”

| Delegats release  ||  May 25, 2017   |||

The lives of rural New Zealanders are at risk every day because of poor connectivity and inequitable health services, a rural health leader says.

Dr Martin London, chair of the Rural Health Alliance of Aotearoa New Zealand (RHAANZ), says government needs to help remove barriers so rural people’s health be considered just as important as those who live in cities.

RHAANZ has 47 national member organisations encompassing rural health providers, agribusiness groups, universities, rural community groups and local government. This week it held a series of national rural conferences and meetings in Wellington.

Later, London met Health Minister Jonathan Coleman outlining RHAANZ’s priorities for improving health services in rural areas: rural wellbeing, rural connectivity, rural research and policy, rural health services and the rural health workforce.

“We reminded him that with at least 600,000 people living in rural regions, effectively New Zealand’s second largest city, we are an important constituency from an economic and political perspective.

“Overseas evidence links health and wellbeing to economic productivity. Intuitively this will apply in NZ so it is an imperative rural people receive their fair share of publicly funded health services and have equitable access to health services.

“We asked him to reinstate rural proofing across all government departments and we want to fast track a new definition of rurality as it pertains to health services in New Zealand. These are two of the most important ways we can hold policy makers to account for equitable health outcomes for rural people.

“Mobile blackspots remain a serious issue across rural New Zealand, especially in case of emergencies. Poor broadband connectivity is a barrier to education and the slow pace of UFB and RBI2 roll-outs are dampening progress, production and innovation,” London says.

The responses to major disasters such as last year’s Hurunui-Kaikoura-Marlborough earthquake show what can be done in an innovative way to bring services to rural areas. Much can be learned from these adverse events and needs to be carried over into business as usual. It’s just a pity it takes a major earthquake to do it.

“We also know there are simply unrealistic expectations placed on the rural health workforce especially in regard to emergency and after-hours services. Our rural health workforce is ageing, tired and burnt-out and we need better retention and recruitment. We need greater workforce flexibility, nurse practitioners and pharmacists for example, as a key way to improve access to health services for rural people.

“We also need to make our small towns liveable so that people want to come and to stay. If we can make our rural communities vibrant again many of our issues will be solved,” London says.

“We want a national virtual health care service for rural New Zealanders, bringing services closer to rural people and helping rural people to age in their own homes. The technology and expertise is there. We need, in an election year, evidence of the political will to see it happen.

“Agriculture and tourism are the powerhouses of our economy. Each year, more than two and a half million tourists visit rural New Zealand. In 2011-2012, $40 billion, or 19 percent of GDP, was generated directly or indirectly by the agri-food sector.

“The Government needs to work with our ideas on rural health and social services if it wants the sector to thrive,” London says.

“We will meet Minister Coleman again at the inaugural Health Hub at the annual Mystery Creek Fieldays in the Waikato next month.”

|  A MakeLemonade release  ||  May 28, 2017   |||

May 11 -  Lincoln Agritech has unveiled an advanced optical nitrate sensor for groundwater which it says will bring a paradigm shift in New Zealand’s groundwater management.

LEADING European farm machinery manufacturer, CLAAS, who are represented throughout New Zealand is significantly increasing its research and development capacities with the construction of a new test centre at the company’s headquarters in Harsewinkel, Germany.

Due to open early next year, the €15 million facility will merge several test laboratories at the site into a single, state-of-the-art complex.

The new complex will boast 8,000 square metres of floor space – the equivalent of about 40 full-size tennis courts – and more than 200 individual workstations and laboratories.

The centre will enable CLAAS to test the performance and reliability of components for its high-performance combine harvesters, forage harvesters and tractors under a wide range of operating and climatic conditions.

It incorporates a number of energy-saving innovations, including the use of 300 kilowatt electric drive units to test transmission components instead of diesel engines.

A heat recovery process will eliminate the need for a conventional heating system during winter, while a water system with heat exchangers fitted to the underfloor radiators will provide cooling in summer.

|  A Claas release  ||  May 10, 2017   |||

John Vosper’s family farm Cleavedale in Matamata went organic in 2003 and two years ago launched the Jersey Girl Organics brand; now the bottled milk is sold North Island-wide and fresh milk is available from two vending machines in Tauranga and Mount Maunganui.

The business won the outstanding producer dairy primary award at the recent Outstanding NZ Food Producer Awards.

Vosper told Dairy News the win affirms “we are on the right track; we are pleased to win award”.

He sees a growing demand for organics in New Zealand.

“Customers are increasingly concerned about where their food is coming from and how it is produced. Organic certification gives them assurance about environmental impacts and the way food is produced.”

Vosper says the farm went organic “as it fitted our farming philosophy and we hoped to increase returns”.

“Our milk is pasteurised to eliminate bugs; it is not homogenised. In the vending machine the milk is kept cold, dark and stirred.

“Jersey Girl milk is audited to strict organic standards. You can be sure the milk is free of antibiotic, herbicide and pesticide residues.”

The farm runs a herd of 250 pedigree Jersey cows, producing about 800,000L; surplus milk is sold to Fonterra.

On the system 2 farm the Jerseys graze on organic pasture, supplemented with hay, silage and maize cut from local paddocks.

A support block was used to graze replacements and produce silage. Vosper says after a series of dry summers the farm started growing maize for silage, giving more options for feed.

“Maize paddocks are planted in permanent pasture consisting of a diverse species mix. After a few years of decreasing pasture production we now have a fertiliser policy of maintaining nutrient levels in the soil and spend above-average amounts on fertiliser.”

The farm calves about 200 cows in spring and 50 in autumn; usually about 55 heifer replacements are reared.

Cows are milked in a 20-bail rotary.

Vosper says animal health is challenging at times as any animal that has a prohibited treatment has to leave the farm. “In future we will be placing more emphasis on animal health traits in sire selection.

“Last October we did four weeks of Jersey semen followed by eight weeks of using short gestation sires. Our empty rate was 10%.”

The Vosper family has been farming on Cleavedale farm for five generations.

Vosper says the family loves organic dairying.

“We love the land we live on and the animals that share it with us; we take pride in producing a top quality milk in a way that honours natural processes.

“Organic production methods require committment and energy. There are no shortcuts, no artificial fertiliser, no production line fast tracking, no modifications.”

|  A Dairy News release  ||  May 10, 2017   |||

New Zealand's pavilion at the World Expo 2020 in Dubai will have strong potential to showcase this country’s primary industry products and innovation in sustainability.

So says Catherine Beard, chief executive of ExportNZ.

The Government has just announced New Zealand will participate in World Expo 2020, to be held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. It is committing $53.3 million to construct a NZ pavilion.

Economic Development Minister Simon Bridges says “that will allow Kiwi businesses to highlight their innovative products and services and open doors to new export markets”.

The expo site will be about 2 sq.km and will contain three themed areas: opportunity, sustainability and mobility. NZ has been invited to participate in the sustainability precinct.

Beard told Rural News Dubai is the largest and most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the UAE is NZ’s largest export market in the Middle East and the country’s 12th-largest trading partner.

“In addition NZ is close to securing a free trade deal with the wider area of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) which includes the UAE and Saudi Arabia,” she says.

“If the trade deal comes off then our exports will become even more competitive than they are now and there will be increased interest from NZ firms to tackle those markets.”

This expo in Dubai will be an important showcase for NZ’s country brand, showing the range of things we can do as a country with a sustainability theme, Beard says. “GCC countries are rich in oil and gas, but lack farmland for food production and have high demand for imported food and drinks,” she says.

“NZ’s trusted dairy and meat exports meet some of that demand and there is increasing interest in food service exports into hotels, restaurant chains, etc.

“GCC countries are also motivated to reduce their trade reliance on oil and diversify their economies into high-tech and service sectors.”

Beard says the focus of NZ’s stand will be showcasing our innovation in sustainability, showing we can do more than just sell commodity products.

“I imagine we will be showcasing sustainability in farming practices right through to manufacturing and services.”

Bridges says showcasing NZ to the world is a crucial aspect of boosting economic growth. Expo 2020 will provide a springboard to promote us as an innovative, solution-focused economy to the 25 million visitors expected to attend from Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and Asia.

“It will also allow us to build on our strong economic and transport links to the UAE, which acts as a global air and sea logistics hub, providing access for NZ exporters to a much wider region. We’re already well connected by five direct daily Emirates flights, contributing $700 million to the economy,” says Bridges.

The expo will run from October 2020 to April 2021.

The organisers expect about 180 nations to participate. NZ is among the first 20 to formally confirm attendance.

|  A Rural News release  ||  May 02, 2017   |||

New Zealand's two big meat co-ops, Silver Fern Farms and Alliance Group have both had new CEOs at the helm for the past two years, each charged with improving returns to their farmer-shareholders. Dean Hamilton and David Surveyor talked to Tony Benny from NZFarmer

Continue here to full article ||  April 27, 2017   |||

If the UK adopts a 'New Zealand trade model' to source more affordable deals for its consumers, it could have a profound effect on olive oil exporters that have faced hurdles when exporting to EU countries.

 At the end of March, UK Minister Theresa May officially triggered Article 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon, setting in motion the two-year negotiation process of Britain leaving the European Union – or as it’s more commonly referred to, Brexit.

The move signals a fundamental change in the way the EU and Britain will conduct trade now and in the future. Not only will this affect trade agreements between the UK and the EU (allowing the UK to freely sell goods to EU countries without incurring additional import taxes), but it’s also set to have a massive impact on food imports which could create new trade opportunities for olive oil producers and exporters located outside of the EU.

The UK currently has a strong reliance on food imports, with an estimated 27 percent of all food eaten in the UK (by value) and 40 percent of all fresh produce coming from the EU. In total, 2016 saw £47.5 billion ($60.8 billion) in food and agricultural products being imported into the UK, of which over 70 percent came from the EU. It’s a need that the UK itself cannot support, with just 164,000 of crop-growing land.

Thanks to Brexit, it is estimated that the prices for imported goods will rise by at least eight percent, with prices for items like olive oil expected to rise by up to 20 percent due to the fact that producers in countries like Italy and Greece have been experiencing poor harvests over the past few months. This price increase is unlikely to change despite any new trade deals brokered between the EU and the UK, thanks to the costly, increased border and customs controls that Brexit will require.

Dutch multinational food and agriculture finance banking company Rabobank has suggested that a solution might be found in the UK adopting a “New Zealand-style trade model,” which would see the elimination of food import tariffs altogether, opening the market to exporters outside of Europe who can offer UK customers similar products at a more favorable price.

One of the import areas where this could occur is olive oil, with UK MP and Prime Minister’s trade envoy to Morocco and Tunisia Andrew Murrison even suggesting that smaller countries with an export capacity (such as Tunisia) could be the key to a more readily available, competitively priced source of olive oil for UK consumers.

In recent years, Tunisia has outstripped several European countries in olive oil production and while the EU currently has waived taxes on up to 35,000 tons of olive oil imports until the end of the year, it is a move that that has not been well received by European farmers, many of whom fear that introducing a cheaper olive oil source into the EU market will undercut local producers.

If the UK does decide to open adopt a more free market approach, it could pose bad news to EU olive oil exporters, who will lose their preferential access to UK buyers via a single market.

Other olive oil producing countries such as Australia might also be able to benefit from Brexit, where farmers have previously complained that the stringent labeling and marketing requirements for exporting olive oil (as well as the subsidization and tariff protection of European goods) make selling to EU markets a significant challenge.

|  An Olive Times release  ||  April 25, 2017   |||

Whether it’s apples from New Zealand or bananas from Ecuador, produce often travels great distances to get to the consumer and loss due to spoilage or other problems along the supply chain is costly and wasteful. But Swiss scientists have come up with a new sensor that could help solve this issue.

The temperature sensing device created by Empa Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology looks and acts like a piece of fruit, down to its shape, size, surface texture, color, and internal composition. The self-powered wireless electronic sensor is surrounded by a solid shell made of polystyrene (a type of plastic), water, and carbohydrates that simulate the fruit’s flesh, according to Thijs Defraeye, a scientist at Empa who is leading the project. Traditional sensors used for this application usually only measure the air temperature in the freight container. To accurately gauge how produce is holding up, though, you need to know the fruit’s core temperature, as a warm inner can lead to spoilage.

The device can be tailor-made for the particular type of fruit, even down to a specific cultivar, like a Braeburn apple or a Kent mango, and it can be packed directly with the fresh produce while in storage or during shipping, says Defraeye. Once the shipment arrives at its destination, the data—things like what the fruits’ core temperature was over time—can be quickly analyzed to determine if there were any problems during the trip.

A fruit spy among mangoes. Empa

In the U.S., an average of 12 percent of fresh fruits and vegetables are lost before making it to the consumer. According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, globally about 1.4 billion tons of food—a value of more than $1 trillion—are lost or wasted each year, about 30 percent of which happens post-harvest (that includes storage and shipping).

Defraeye believes there are a variety of different applications for the sensor all along the supply chain—from greenhouses and orchards, to cold storage and ripening facilities, to the transportation sector—by exporters, importers, wholesalers, and retailers alike.

“They will be able to better pinpoint the location and reason for unexpected quality loss, which is essential for quality claims,” Defraeye tells Modern Farmer in an email.

Initial field tests on the sensors are under way and the researchers are now looking for potential industrial partners to manufacture the devices, which they believe would cost less than $50 per unit.

|  A ModernFarmer release  ||  April 18, 2017   |||