But in telling that story exporters have to be very careful in the words they choose.
Americans, for instance, think of industrial scale feedlots when they hear the word farm. When they hear the word organic they think chemical-free but customers in China hearing the same word think free-range, Sliper told the Future Farms conference in Palmerston North.
Landcorp’s Pamu brand has a product launch soon and is leveraging its full traceability back to single farms, its guaranteed organic status and, under the slogan Nothing but Nature, the fact it has no genetic modification, not antibiotics and no growth hormones.
But developing new products aimed at high-end niche markets is not easy.
Landcorp has been working on a deer milk product. So far it has worked with 45 different people and companies and doesn’t have a product yet.
He had found NZ is not set up to do niche products to add value and anyone doing so needs to build a supply chain to sell them.
Though Landcorp had some success by selling all its coarse wool through the NZ Merino Company and so many of the things it does resonate with customers the country is not marketing effectively.
So in developing cosmetics from deer milk Landcorp had got alongside people from outside the sector for advice on what to do and how to sell it.
And Sliper suggested the ban on foreign investment in farms will not be a bad thing.
He quoted the slogan Brand not Land to sum up the attitude of investors.
They are shifting their focus away from land and assets to brands. Assets were simply enablers to allow companies to have flexible processing and supply arrangements hence stock markets valuing companies with popular brands rather than those that are asset rich..
“There is a lot of cash and people sniffing round for these brand opportunities,” he said.
However, there were also people looking for opportunites to criticise, such as Peta accused farmers of skinning sheep when they were simply shearing them.
They could use social media and get a public reaction with incredible speed but there was no point fighting them or trying to debate with them. Anyone using logic to combat their emotional claims would lose every time.
Instead, Landcorp’s response was to get its customers over here and put them on farms to talk to the people on those farms and see for themselves.
It found then its work reaching out to customers had a spin-off in motivating staff whose enjoyment increased when they know what customers do with their products.
But public perception was another matter, with a recent survey showing a fall in public approval for farming, with little difference between the views of urban and rural people.
That meant farmers were either not doing a good job of changing their practices or not selling the story well enough to pass public muster. Sliper suspected it was a bit of both.
But farmers had to understand those concerns.
They couldn’t go on blaming the media for fringe groups.
Farmers had to realise people formed opinions and their momentum took effect quickly. Two major firearms retailers in America after the Florida school schooting raised the age to buy guns from 18 to 21 simply because of public pressure on social media.
The same effect was forcing supermarkets to abandon plastic bags.
But in considering the threat of synthetic foods farmers should not consider the danger came from crazy lefties or other fringe elements.
Research showed 70% of people are willing to try laboratory meat and 80% of people buying a mayonnnaise called Not Mayo because it has no eggs or dairy are not vegans. The Not Mayo company plans to make yoghurt, milk and cheese as well.
“They are moving right into NZ’s space.”
Sliper said he had approaches from farmers wanting to grow the protein for synthetic meat but saw that as one of the least imaginative options available. It would simply be moving from one commodity to another, where some one else determined the price.
Banning people from calling these products meat was like trying to say electric vehicles couldn’t be called cars and wouldn’t work.
Instead synthetics have to be regarded as mainstream products and meat producers have to understand why people want them.
Landcorp believes people will always want meat and dairy but it has to make sure it meets their demands in what it does on its farms as it moves from being a farming company to a health foods company taking its products from commodities to premium and special products.
