Country Life

This week Country Life returns to a vegetable farm to see whether it's radical plan to feed the community is working and looks at plans for plastic waste on farm. And the team meet a animal advocate who has turned her rural property in North Canterbury into a haven for rescued farm animals.

Sharlene Wilson has turned her rural property in North Canterbury into a haven for rescued farm animals who find healing, freedom and a place to truly belong.

Crooked Vege's pay-what-you-can model for its vege boxes may have been a radical idea two years ago but it's plan seems to be working. The small farm has had its challenges, though.

Agrecovery's seen huge growth in the 20 years it's been operating, with those in the primary sector looking for new ways to recycle on-farm plastic. "We know the farmers and growers are wanting solutions."

Country Life speaks to farmers and growers around New Zealand to find out about growing conditions over the past month.

This week Country Life dives underground to take a closer look at soils, from Canterbury farmers using the Japanese Bokashi system to a market gardener making garden beds as rich as chocolate cake in Taranaki. We also unpack the recently announced biodiversity credits.

Over the past 20 years, Jodi Roebuck and his wife Tanya have turned a bare paddock into a thriving market garden with an emphasis on microgreens, teachers others from around the world how to do the same.

Bokashi, the Japanese anaerobic composting system which ferments organic matter, is helping to maintain healthy soils on a sheep and dairy grazing farm in North Canterbury.

A round-up of the week's news from the primary sector.

News that the government is looking to support a market system to help fund the huge cost of restoring nature could be music to the ears of farmers and iwi wanting to do their bit for biodiversity but facing huge costs. So what are biodiversity credits and how do they work?

This week Country Life celebrates Matariki with stories about Māori horticultural wisdom and a couple setting up star gazing experiences on their farm.

This Matariki, the stars align for Mark and Susannah Guscott - award winners bringing whakapapa and astronomy together on their sixth-generation Wairarapa farm.

The McClutchie whānau explores growing different crops, with aspirations to grow Māori medicinal plants, on their family whenua in North Taranaki.

Nick Rahiri Roskruge is Country Life's guest this week. His work in agriculture and soil science have taken him far afield looking at crops sustaining indigenous communities.

A round-up of the week's news from the primary sector.