The Innovative Farming Award was taken out by Canterbury calf rearing business Maatua Hou.
Set up by four couples, Maatua Hou owns a 34ha dry stock block at Burnham, about 40km outside of Christchurch.
Judges were impressed by the way they had created a business on a small land holding with an alternative calf rearing model that reduced bobby calf wastage, and was based on profit-sharing.
Lincoln University’s Dryland Pastures Research Group won the Science and Research Award.
For the past 20 years, the Dryland Pastures Research Group has provided science that guides farmers to raise production on sheep and beef farms in hill country throughout New Zealand.
Their work has transformed thousands of hectares of East Coast hill country, from Central Otago to Gisborne, by using legumes to address low nitrogen.
Judges praised the group for producing an important body of work, tackling multiple soil types and farming environments to improve productivity, resilience and environmental sustainability.
The Technology Award was won by software decision support-tool Farmax, which is widely used by pastoral farmers to help balance financial, environmental and production goals.
Winner of the Market Leader Award was Coastal Lamb Ltd, a brand launched by Richard and Suze Redmayne in 2010 in their quest to better understand their lambs’ end-consumers.
Today the company has 17 family-owned supply farms. Critical to its success is connecting the farms with consumers — including chefs — many of whom have never met a farmer before.
The Emerging Achiever Award was won by Cambridge’s Estee Browne, a breeding programme manager for Browne Pastoral Enterprise’s sheep milking unit.
The People and Development Award went to Agri-Women’s Development Trust which encourages women to accelerate progress and change in the primary sector and rural communities.
Over the past 11 years the charitable trust has helped nearly 5000 people with their confidence, leadership and influence — from the farm to the boardroom.
Rural Champion Award winner Sandra Matthews was instrumental in setting up Farming Women Tairawhiti, which now has a membership of more than 850 primary industry women.
She stepped back from it last year to take on several national governance and consulting roles, and to focus on her own business coaching business.
The Significant Contribution Award was won by AgResearch scientist David Stevens.
Invermay’s farm systems scientist was initially involved in plant breeding, but this changed in the early 1990s.
Farmers needed forages that would deliver animal performance, so he and his colleagues began doing animal production trials alongside agronomic trials.
This evolved into farm systems work, and he has been pivotal in creating the foundation of modern sheep and beef farming systems which have delivered prosperity to many farmers.
The East Coast Rural Support Trust was the winner of the Leadership Award.
B+LNZ chairman Andrew Morrison said the achievements of the sector over the past couple of years and its resilience in maintaining strong exports in light of Covid-19 was remarkable.
