Seeing is believing: inaugural Vegetables Big Day Out a success

5 February 2025

More than 200 vegetable growers, agronomists, researchers, government officials and tech suppliers flooded through the gates to participate in the inaugural Vegetables Big Day Out event, held in Pukekohe on 3 and 4 February. 

The event was hosted by the new, Te Ahikawariki Vegetable Industry Centre of Excellence (VICE), with participation from A Lighter Touch, Plant & Food Research, and the various vegetable product groups.

The event was officially opened by Biosecurity and Associate Agriculture Minister, Andrew Hoggard and Ngāti Tamaoho Trust representatives, Roimata Minhinnick and Edith Tuhimata. What followed were two days of infield demonstrations, and classroom presentations and discussions.

Out in the field, attendees got to see integrated pest management (IPM) in action. Put simply, how the good bugs are being housed in native plants and other flowers around the perimeter of the crop – in this case, lettuce – ready to pounce if and when the bad bugs have a go at the lettuce.

Elsewhere in the field, high tech was being demonstrated, including a sprayer equipped drone, a small robotic tractor, and an electric weeder towed behind a normal tractor. 

It was interesting to note that very drone being demonstrated was off to spray pine trees for the forestry industry the following day – and the small robotic tractor is being trialed by strawberry and grape growers in New Zealand, for mowing and weeding under chest height strawberry rows and under grape vines. 

Back in the classroom, Edith Tuhimata – Manager of the Environmental Unit at Ngāti Tamaoho – took attendees through the cultural indicator for freshwater quality, which she has developed and is applying in and around the Pukekohe area.

The indicator combines Māori perspectives with scientific ones, to provide a baseline for water quality and what should be done to preserve or improve water quality, for generations to come.

Also in the classroom, a panel of some of the industry’s youngest and keenest participants talked through how they got into the industry and what their aspirations are. The panel concluded that to get ahead, young people need to speak up, make themselves visible and say ‘yes’ to every opportunity. The panel was diverse in make-up – two growers, one agronomist, one scientist and one advocate. They had all entered the industry through different routes and had taken different education and skill development pathways.

An overseas perspective on growing was also provided, by a small group of visiting growers from America, Canada and Australia. Like Biosecurity and Associate Agriculture Minister, Andrew Hoggard, these growers were impressed by the event and what they had seen elsewhere in the Pukekohe district.

In his opening address, Andrew provided the vegetable industry with reassurance, particularly in terms of upcoming changes to resource management legislation. He said he expected that the Government would have more to say by the middle of the year, and that when the proposals were announced, it was important that the industry made its views known.