Agricultural Fieldays are held every year at Mystery Creek near Hamilton. These four days – June 14th to 17th – are a time for farmers to find out what is new in technology, in different methods of farming and different products to use in farming. It is also a time for farmers to look at new machinery and decide what they need and what they can afford. This year, when the price for milk solids is good, dairy farmers could be thinking of replacing farm machinery like tractors. About 1,000 exhibitors have a stall either indoors or outdoors showing what they have to sell.
About 130,000 people visit Mystery Creek every year, not all of them farmers. Many international visitors come too, especially from Australia but also from other countries where farming is important. They want to see what New Zealand can offer them to use on their farms. New Zealand businesses are interested in selling farming machinery, technology or farming products to other countries. Interpreters in Mandarin, Hindi, Spanish, Korean and some other languages are available.
Farming innovations are of interest, how to improve the environment, or animal health for example. More and more these days, farmers are using technology to save time and money, as well as to improve the land.
There are interesting events also for people to watch and enjoy like tractor pulling competitions, or fencing competitions (the fastest farmer to build a good fence) and useful prizes for winners. School groups visit and young people with an interest in farming careers can see what opportunities, like scholarships, are available.
And each day chefs show what they can do with food products produced on New Zealand farms – meat, cheese and wine for instance. There is something for everybody at the Mystery Creek Fieldays.
Vocabulary
• milk solids become milk powder
• exhibitors – people who have a product to show or sell
• stall – a small space inside a large building where the exhibitor shows the product, like a shop
• innovations – new ideas, new products
• fencing – wire fences around a paddock