Branching Out Phase 2: Practical implementation of food and fibre value chain diversification
Project start: 26 October 2022
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $975,000
Industry funding: $1,200,815
Industry partner: Venture Taranaki Trust
Region: Taranaki
This project follows on from Branching Out Phase 1 and will work in 6 sectors to confirm that diversification in food and fibre value chains is possible and practical. It will undertake growing trials on farms/orchards, pilot product prototypes, and provide case studies as well as practical tools for implementation. The 6 sectors include hemp fibre, medicinal ingredients, indigenous ingredients, hops, gin botanicals, and high value food crops.
Branching Out – Venture Taranaki
Accelerating growth of Tai Tokerau’s food and beverage manufacturing sector
Project start: 4 July 2022
Project length: 1 year
MPI funding: $86,720
Industry funding: $224,200
Industry partner: Northland Inc, Far North Holdings Limited
Region: Northland
This project will conduct a feasibility study into establishing a shared food and beverage manufacturing facility in Te Tai Tokerau. The facility aims to help food and beverage manufacturers build their capability and grow their businesses to a scale where they can operate in their own dedicated manufacturing premises.
Future Farming Amuri Basin
Project start: 28 June 2022
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $1,496,500
Industry funding: $1,196,500
Industry partner: Ecan, DairyNZ
Region: Canterbury
This project will take sustainable farming beyond the regulatory minimums by continually improving management practice. It will seek ways to adapt to climate change, monitor water quality and manage community expectations. This will be achieved through establishing farmer-based catchment groups to empower them to find solutions to their collective challenges; developing a spatial risk-based resource management modelling system; and piloting a local price-based incentive mechanism to accelerate freshwater improvements.
Government backs strategy to improve water quality in Amuri Basin – Government media release
Network technology to optimise readiness, response and eradication of bio-security incursions in the primary sector
Project start: 1 April 2022
Project length: 3 year
MPI funding: $4,000,000
Industry funding: $6,000,000
Industry partner: OnSide Ltd
Region: Nationwide
This project will expand biosecurity readiness and response software developed by Onside Ltd. The software uses data from a range of sources to construct an intricate map of rural interactions that’s able to map potential disease pathways. It will be a faster and more efficient way of supporting biosecurity management activity.
Govt invests in cost-saving biosecurity app to protect rural sector – Government media release
Advisory support for agricultural and horticultural science in schools
Project start: 11 April 2022
Project length: 5 years
MPI funding: $1,600,000
Industry funding: $400,000
Industry partner: Waikato Anglican College Trust
Region: Nationwide
This project will increase support for agriculture and horticulture science teachers in secondary schools. It will develop a support network of one full-time adviser and a support person based at St Paul’s Collegiate, and up to 16 part-time regionally based advisers. The network will provide support to teachers, create resources, and provide links to local primary industry partners.
Boost for agricultural and horticultural science in schools – Government media release
Improving allied veterinary professional utilisation
Project start: 1 April 2022
Project length: 2 years
MPI funding: $80,000
Industry funding: $49,900
Industry partner: Massey University, Lewis Fitch Fund, Roger Morris Foundation Trust
Region: Nationwide
Allied Veterinary Professionals (AVPs) and paraprofessionals include veterinary technologists, nurses, technicians and assistants. This project will explore how AVPs and paraprofessionals are currently utilised in New Zealand veterinary practices, identify any perceived and real barriers to leveraging them appropriately, and develop resources that will help practices better use AVPs as part of the wider veterinary team.
Open Farms 2022-2024
Project start: 16 March 2022
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $90,000
Industry funding: $210,000
Industry partner: Beef + Lamb New Zealand, DairyNZ, Farmlands and Farmers Weekly
Region: Nationwide
Open Farms is a nationwide series of on-farm events designed to reconnect urban Kiwis with our land, food and farmers. The platform supports farmers to host engaging, safe events on a single 'national open farm day'. It provides a space for all New Zealanders to participate in our farming story first-hand.
Open Farms 2021 – Youtube (1.12)
Delivering sustainable benefits for the primary sector through a rural focused IoT network
Project start: 15 March 2022
Project length: 1 year
MPI funding: $120,000
Industry funding: $149,500
Industry partner: WISPA Network Limited
Region: Nationwide
This project seeks to address on-farm connectivity, which remains a significant barrier to farmers widely adopting agricultural technology solutions. The project will work through several commercial issues. It will test a collaborative delivery model for a nationwide, rural-focused LoRaWAN (Long Range Wide Area Network), and develop a business model for its rollout.
Boosting rural connectivity aims to deliver sustainable benefits to Kiwi farmers – MPI media release
Spatial integrated farm plan
Project start: 16 February 2022
Project length: 1 year 4 months
MPI funding: $398,952
Industry funding: $205,968
Industry partner: LandPlan Trust
Region: Nationwide
The project will develop and test a free online tool for farmers to help them meet the new greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction targets that will come into effect in 2025. The tool will help farmers and communities apply landscape planning and farm land-use modelling to produce farm plans that tackle known GHG and other environmental issues, including water management.
From the Ground Up – building value and volume for Auckland
Project start: 26 November 2021
Project length: 2 years
MPI funding: $180,000
Industry funding: $270,000
Industry partner: Auckland Unlimited
Region: Auckland
This project will assist a collective of food and beverage businesses on their journey toward greater resilience, productivity, and outcomes, with support from global expertise and best practice specialists. It will develop three volume-to-value initiatives to help build a sustainable regional food and beverage ecosystem that focuses on the seafood and potato industries.
Preliminary evaluation of potential feed-based commercial solutions to the problem of ruminant methane emissions
Project start: 6 October 2021
Project length: 2 years
MPI funding: $998,400
Industry funding: $1,497,785
Industry partner: Methane Mitigation Ventures Ltd, CH4 Global, Lone Star Farms, ANZCO/Five Star Beef
Region: Nationwide
Mootral™, a natural plant-based feed supplement, and Asparagopsis armata, a type of seaweed that contains bromoform, have both been shown to reduce methane emissions from ruminants in research settings but have not yet been trialled in pastoral conditions. This project will evaluate the effectiveness of these two supplements, develop practical feeding systems, and assess the potential commercial viability of these bioactive products in New Zealand.
Improving the embryo development process and increasing New Zealand's supply of elite merit bulls
Project start: 1 October 2021
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $598,188
Industry funding: $1,084,182
Industry partner: Rissington Farms Limited, Kai Mana Milltrust, Synthase Biotech
Region: Nationwide
This project increases supply of elite-merit bulls for New Zealand’s dairy beef industry, providing farmers with better, cheaper tools to improve animal welfare and reduce net greenhouse gas emissions, while maintaining herd performance and boosting profitability. The project also pilots a novel, high-throughput, cattle embryo development technology, and will determine its economic viability at a commercial scale for cattle genetics companies and farmers.
Pathways to primary sector leadership: Māori women & young women
Project start: 2 September 2021
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $566,650
Industry funding: $228,000
Industry partner: Agri-Women’s Development Charitable Trust (AWDT), Agricultural and Marketing Research and Development Trust (AGMARDT)
Region: Nationwide
This project will deliver two leadership development programmes, Māori Women’s Leadership - Wāhine o te Whenua and 'Generation Change' for young women in tertiary study or training – Pathways to Primary Sector Careers. The programmes will empower Māori women and young women to accelerate progress and change in New Zealand’s primary sector and rural communities.
Supporting Otago South catchment groups to improve ecosystem health
Project start: 1 July 2021
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $1,804,977
Industry funding: $1,669,499
Industry partner: Otago South River Care
Region: Otago
This project will engage South Otago communities to improve ecosystem health, freshwater quality, and increase the value of food and fibre products produced in the district. The project involves community and school events, establishing farmer networks and catchment groups, implementation and demonstration of good management practices, water quality testing, the development of new innovative mitigation options, and research into consumer expectations for sustainable, high value food and fibre.
$1.8m for water quality work – Otago Daily Times
Multi-weed biocontrol
Project start: 14 June 2021
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $2,090,000
Industry funding: $1,200,000
Industry partner: Landcare Research New Zealand Limited, the National Biocontrol Collective (a consortium of regional councils, unitary authorities, and DOC)
Region: Nationwide
This project will develop simultaneous biocontrol solutions for 6 high priority weeds through a coordinated national research project with the National Biocontrol Collective. These weeds are costly to control for landowners and councils. Over time, successful biocontrol of these weeds will reduce the need to use conventional herbicides. Productivity of the land will be improved, as well as farmers' ability to comply with environmental regulations.
Nationwide project offers hope in war against weeds – MPI media release
Implementing a transformative business model for New Zealand Young Farmers
Project start: 14 May 2021
Project length: 3 years
MPI funding: $1,760,000
Industry funding: $711,288
Industry partner: New Zealand Young Farmers
Region: Nationwide
This project will enable New Zealand Young Farmers to better support young people in the primary sector by strengthening its core business, future-proofing the organisation, and ensuring its financial sustainability.
Investing in the future of New Zealand Young Farmers – Government media release
