Finding the right balance
It was the good farmland for a good price, and the proximity to a town, that originally brought Bernadette Hunt and her husband to Southland. But it is the community spirit that has made it home.
Bernadette was in Waikato when she met her husband Alistair (originally from England) while at teacher’s college, and they started looking for farms in areas where Bernadette could also get a teaching job. “Friends of ours lived and farmed in Southland. The land values were a lot lower at the time than where we lived in the Waikato and we decided on this farm in Eastern Southland.” The couple run sheep and beef. Rather than breeding the animals themselves, they purchase partially grown stock from others and grow them to their meat potential – not everyone has the type of ground and grass to be able to do this, but their farm was set up specifically for growing animals. They also grow arable crops, and offer an agricultural contracting service.
Bernadette is currently vice president of Southland Federated Farmers, president of the local gymnastics club, and on the Southland Regional Forum. “Volunteering is in my blood and it’s big in Gore. That’s one of the reasons we love it here – it’s a great place to farm and raise a family. “What’s special is the community spirit. When things are tough it draws people together – like with last year’s February floods and Covid-19 – we all got stuck in to make sure people were supported.” Bernadette became involved with Federated Farmers because she wanted to understand the water and land planning process.
Some years later, she put her hand up to be part of the Southland Regional Forum, which is tasked with coming up with recommendations for Environment Southland and Te Ao Marama Inc on how to meet the region’s freshwater objectives. “I had some knowledge to bring to the table. I’ve done a lot to try and help nonfarming people understand life from a farming perspective.” Balancing people’s expectations is the biggest challenge for the Regional Forum. “The climate and soil is great for growing; Southland is a great place to farm. It’s hard to put the brakes on when you can see the potential. But there are costs, and not just financial. There will need to be a new way of looking at things into the future. In the past, success was measured by how much land you drained or fenced, or how much milk solids or wool was produced. We’re going to have to define success differently, balancing sustainability into the future with the livelihoods of people now.”
The Regional Forum is made up of people from all over the community, with different values, backgrounds and interests, drawn together to try and weigh all these things up and find a way forward that will work. “I want to find a way to balance all this – so my kids’ generation and those after them can still farm productively and profitably. We produce amazing food products in Southland and I would hope that that is still going on for the next generation. “Hopefully [by then] we’ve found a way to balance so we can be proud of what we produce, in the knowledge that we’re not taking more than there is to take.”
