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To many Kia Ora, is an orange cordial drink mixed with water. For 35 Irish companies “Kia Ora” is the Maori for "welcome", "hello" or "be well" which awaits them this week as exhibitors at the 50th National Fieldays of New Zealand, on the outskirts of the North Island city of Hamilton.
Fieldays could be best imagined as visiting the National Ploughing Championships without any ploughing.
Irish agricultural technology is well-represented by the well-known brands and market leaders many which are long standing distributors in New Zealand.
Irish exhibitors during the week include McHale (through their distributor Power Farming), Tanco and Dromone (through Ag Attachments Ltd), Malone, ProDig, Hi-Spec (through Giltrap AgriZone), Keenan, Dairymaster, Cross Engineering, Moocall and many others.
All Irish companies exhibiting here are targeting sales or distribution channels with some of the early stage exporters here to understand the market.
Fieldays Innovation Award
Two such companies are entrants to the international category at the Fieldays Innovation Award are Agrilume and Rainsense. The international judging awards will be announced on Thursday evening at a special international business networking event at the show.
Irish companies are competing and winning business in a globally competitive environment based on reputation for quality, reliability and service.
Between Wednesday and Saturday, Fieldays and the 1,000 exhibitors will expect approximately 130,000 visitors over the four-day event. The opening day, Wednesday, 13 June saw 24,663 visitors on the first day of the 50th anniversary event, despite drizzly conditions.
With weather due to improve over the coming days, event organisers are expecting a bumper crowd to surpass last year’s record of 133,588 visitors.
Largest agricultural show
Fieldays is the southern hemisphere’s largest agricultural show and generated in excess of NZ$538m (€320m) in sales last year.
Speaking with commercial manager Nick Dromgool, in advance of the show’s opening, he highlighted “the future of farming” as the theme of the 2018 event.
He also drew attention to a recent Economic Impact report completed by the University of Waikato has analysed the economic impact of Fieldays over it’s 50 year lifetime and estimated that the show has generated in excess of NZ$18bn dollars (€11bn) to the national economy.
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