Ngai Tahu swapping forests for farms

Friday 4 Apr 2014

 
In New Zealand, over the next 15 years Ngai Tahu expects to build the value of its agricultural investment to more than NZ$1.5 billion, helped by its conversion of forestry land into dairy farms. Ngai Tahu Property chief executive Tony Sewell said the NZ$1.5b target would be backed by hundreds of millions of dollars of extra capital investment.

The iwi would invest NZ$600 million in land conversion, stock and dairy company shares. The first tranche of that expenditure, to date and over the next five years, would be NZ$150m, including the transformation of Eyrewell and Balmoral forest land to irrigated pasture.

Sewell said Ngai Tahu Property's early farm investments included 36,000 hectares of high country property at Greenstone, Routeburn and Elfin Bay, near the head of Lake Wakatipu. Eyrewell and Balmoral were recent additions. Forestry Land held for farm development included 7,000ha at Eyrewell 9,000ha at Balmoral and about 10, 000ha on the West Coast. Already about 30 per cent of the Balmoral land had been cleared.

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Source: Stuff News

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