REX March 12 - Jason Herrick, Joanne Hort and Patsy Bass

0:00This is a podcast from Rover. Rover? Rover will exchange with Netspees, keeping the country connected. Good day, everyone. Welcome to the Rex Daily Podcast. Fourth Thursday, the 12th of March. I'm Dom George. The show is brought to you by the team at Net Speed. Oh, 100 Net Speed, Net Speed. .NET.NZ coming up on the program today in a moment. We're going to be talking with Jason Herrick from Federated Pharmacies, the Southland President. And they're saying that some new cultural values are excessive and unworkable. New requirements for every farmer in gore to have resource consent assessed against no tar who cultural value. So Jason Herrick, on that, I thought that that had already been put to be, but apparently it's come up again. So we're going to get to the bottom of that, find out exactly what these cultural requirements are. Also, we're going to be talking with Professor Joanna Hort from Massey University. She's from a part of that university called Feast.

1:03And that is the food experience and sensory testing laboratory. And we're going to be talking about this new study that is found consumers can taste differences in milk, depending on what cows eat alongside the stage of lactation at which the milk is produced. So find out more about that. Plus Patsy Bass, the chief executive of Refton Distilling Co, whose story we have followed almost since the inception of the company, has decided to step down from that particular role. So we'll find out what she's got next up her sleeve and what is next for the team at Refton Distilling Co as well. So that's all coming up for you here on the Rex Daily Podcast. Enjoy. Rumor will exchange with Netspeed. Internet till the cows come on. Rodeo, here's an interesting one for you. So Federated Farmers put out a media release yesterday saying controversial new requirements for every farmer in Goa to have resource consent assessed by Naitahu Cultural Values or against Naitahu Cultural Values, thus saying it's excessive and unworkable.

2:04So we thought we'd get Jason Herrick on the Southland Fed Farmers president to explain exactly what's going on here, because I think I'm a little bit confused. Jason, it's nice to have you on. How you doing? Yeah, thanks for having me, Dom. Definitely, I can see how it can be a confusing situation. Well, I thought this was already taken care of, because I'm sure we spoke about this a few years ago where the council there was going through something similar and then decided to scrap it. Can you give me the history of this? Yeah, so this is actually the Goa District Plan. So when they released it in 2020-23, they had the whole area classed as a site of significance to Māori, a site of area of significance to Māori, and that required everybody to engage with the local Rūnanga and EEW

3:05on a consenting process, adding a whole lot of complexity, cost, and time to all consents. And that was just going to be unworkable in a sense. And they had that written in what the class is, the Saisam chapter in the plan. And when we all submitted against it and bought it to the attention to the council, they decided to scrap that chapter, but they replaced it with the Cultural Values chapter, which is pretty much the same thing just with a different name. And the way that they have released the plan, so they have notified the plan after all the consultation and submissions and the hearings. And this is where we've landed, and it really hasn't changed a whole lot since they released the first Saisam chapter. So we absolutely believe this is the right thing to do. We need to appeal this. Not just for farmers, but for people in the Goa and Matolda towns as well, right?

4:06So because anything they do with their land are going to need a cultural assessment as well, and it's all the way it's written. So yeah, we're in constant dialogue with local Runainga and the people involved. What's the local Runainga said about this? You're like, I mean, they just want what's best for the area and the protection of those sites, of significance around the area. There's no two ways about that. This is all in the way it's written in the wording. All of this, like we firmly believe here at Feds, all this is going to do is destroy relationships between the local Runainga farmers and members of the public because of the bureaucracy involved in getting a consent or actually doing anything on your property. Like, for instance, use a silage bat as an example. If a farmer wanted to change the direction of a silage bat or shift it slightly or, you know, and modify it, it's going to need a cultural assessment done.

5:10And that's just going to be time, delay, cost, complexity, you know, all of those things. And same with anybody doing some earth works in their backyard and gore, so to speak, if they wanted to, you know, build a swimming pool or whatever before the shift in your soil, they're going to need a cultural assessment on the soil in case it has a cultural impact on the soil. So it's all in the way it's written. And the Runainga definitely don't want that side of it. You know, their interpretation is different to the way it's written. And so it's the way it's written, that's the problem. And we need to make sure we get that sorted properly. Why would the Gore Council go down this road when it's kind of already proven to be popular? What's the point? I'm still kind of confused. Yeah, so when they notified the plan and they rewrote it and then notified it, they filtered out with a whole lot of legal, complex jargon. I call it just, you know, to confuse us.

6:10And we really had to dig deep in and involve lawyers to decipher it all. And I said it at the Y Mu Mu show in a panel I sat on around the automation that I firmly believe that planners and councils all live on a different planet to the rest of us. You know, these guys need to be pulled into line. They need to be, you know, shown a little bit of reality and a bit of common sense wouldn't go on this in their daily planning. You know, so they're trying to get things, you know, past the goalpost by making it fairly complex if people don't understand it. But again, you know, we've just got to work together as a community and get this right because this sets a precedent for the rest of the country if we don't. Yeah, I was thinking exactly the same thing. So I want to have a look actually at what the actual, I guess, parameters for this are. So we're talking about things like life force, spiritual connections, restoring balance,

7:10relationships between life forms, etc, etc. These sorts of things. They sound very, I guess, spiritual in nature. Absolutely. You know, and it's really important to the local e-wee that we do respect any side of significance to them, right? And the way we want this is if somebody does find something of significance, would like them to be notified, right? They'd notify the local Roononger and work together with them and so on. All this is going to do is create people to hide stuff, right? And it not get to the channels it needs to get to and the protection is put in place. It needs to be protected. You know, we do have some history here in New Zealand. We'd like to protect that history. No two ways about it. But we've got to have a common sense way of working around this and make sure it's good for everybody. Because it seems to me that my toe,

8:11who seems to be very progressive, shit, they've done so, a lot of good work. They support a lot of things around the South Island. They seem exceedingly savvy when it comes to business. I just can't imagine that Naitahi, who would be wanting to put roadblocks in the way of progress. That doesn't fit. Exactly. And that's their sentiment as well from the conversations that I've had with them at the end of the day. And all they want is the protection of those sites of significance and any new sites that get found. Right? So. And they just want to work with the communities. And that's what they're telling us. So we've got to take them on their word. And so on. And, you know, I've got a bit of multi heritage too. And in Naitahi, Dom, and, you know, I'm looking into my family history in that as well. Doesn't mean to say that I'm going to be fully involved with Naitahi.

9:12But at the end of the day, I'm here for every New Zealander, not just for molding, not just for pakiha, or any other ethnic background. I'm here for everybody. So then would it just be a case of, I don't know, what's the goal council thinking here? What, what, what, what sort of feedback have you had from these guys? I've tried to get in touch with Ben Bell, because initially he said to me earlier on, if we were thinking about appealing to getting in contact with the local Mayor and have a discussion and see if he could come to a resolution. But to be honest, the only way to sort this is through an appeal process. I have tried to ring them in the last couple of days. He's not returning my calls and he's not answering them. So we'll see. I'll get in contact with them eventually. And see where we land. We all know that good district council have absolutely no money. There is broke, there is broke as anything. They won't want this to go to court. We're hoping to put it through a mediation process. But if we have to take this to court,

10:12that'll be the direction we have to go. I think back when it was first, or you can correct me on this if I'm not getting it right. But there's something like 91 rules or standards that would be assessed when applying for a consent. Is that right? No, we're talking about 91 in terms of this sort of the cultural impacts. Yeah, correct. So rather than being permitted activities, these things, 91 things that are listed, that's how they analyse the cultural impact. And if they believe that it's going to have a cultural impact, then it's got to go through that consenting phase and doesn't become permitted after all. So yeah, like I said, it's complex. The way it's written. And the wording needs to change to make it more user friendly, a bit of common sense and a bit of reality. So is this a bit of a Gore District Council thing going? I mean, in fact, they haven't been able to get hold of the mayor

11:13to clarify otherwise. I guess it leaves it open to speculation. I mean, it seems to me like it's kind of, they might have a bit of egg on their face, maybe, because their original proposal had a lot of backlash, or they're just trying to, I don't know, seem to be doing the right thing, or something like that. And we can only hypothesise us to their intention, I suppose. Absolutely. I don't know. We don't know what we don't know, until we had that discussion with them. We'll find out initially the mayor's comments to me was he was really happy with where the plan had landed. Clearly he didn't understand it himself, I would say. Or he was trying to sway me in a different direction. I don't know. But, you know, I've come to learn that councils operate differently to the rest of us, Tom. And we've just got to keep doing what we're doing to keep them honest, make sure they're pointed in the right direction, that is in the best interest of all ratepayers and their agents.

12:15Because it seems suspiciously to me like it's a case of the council having far too much say over what someone does with their individual property. Great. And it's almost a rowding property rights. And that's what we stand for. Everybody has property rights. And they must maintain those property rights and not take it away from the individuals. And that's just seems to be what's happening more and more. So we'll just keep fighting the fight and keep standing up for the for the fellas and lasses on the ground and make sure we get what's right. That Ben Bell, you mentioned to me earlier, he's the young fella, isn't he? Yeah, he's a young fella. And obviously, it's a quite a bit of life experience under his about into the future. And that will help him in good stead to, you know, lead the way for councils in the future. But, you know, we'll just keep working with him and see where we end up. So what's the process from here? You're obviously going to appear. What's the timeline around that?

13:16So yeah, it all depends on the court process. So the court lays down the parameters around it. So once we lodge an appeal, our appeal will get notified if anyone else appeals. We will get notified of their appeals and so on. And then we start talking and then decide whether we're going down the court route or intermediation. Because it seems to me just to finish up here. And I do appreciate your time that it's got an element here of. And too far too much interpretation. What once you open these things up to people's personal interpretations, you're just opening a can of worms that's going to be very, very difficult to put back in, you know. Exactly. And that's the conversation I'm having with the local Roonunger, you know, even though the people in charge of the Roonunger now, their interpretation is different. The way it's written, anybody who comes in in the future can interpret it in a totally different manner.

14:17And absolute rule with an iron fist. And we don't want that right. And we don't want anybody to be put in that position. So like I said, we've got to get this right. Good man. I'll let you get on with your day. We'll watch this one with interest. Cheers, Jace. You're welcome, Dom. Have a great weekend. And am I going to see it? Want to go show this year? Are you definitely, yeah, you're heading down, are you? I'm heading there right now. Ah, perfect, perfect, perfect. All catch up sounds good, mate. Talk to you there. All right, buddy. Sounds great. Thanks. All right. As we know, you are what you eat. Same goes for milk related to what the dairy cows eat. It has an influence on flavor and texture. Very interesting stuff. Sweet, salty, cardboardy, a hint of tallow. Those are some of the descriptions that the researchers in this study have come across. And we join now by Professor Joanne Hort, who is from Mass University's food experience and sensory testing lab. Otherwise, no one has the feasts. Very nice, nice acronym. Go ahead and love it to have you on.

15:18How are you? I'm good. Thank you. Yes. And we like a good feast as well. You can imagine where all food is here. Yes. So the research that we're talking about today is on top of previous research. We know for sure that diet changes how the milk or the meat from an animal is going to taste. But the focus for this project was understanding how if New Zealand moved to a more diverse pasture for its cows to eat or its sheep to eat, and whether it followed contemporary management practices or regenerative management practices, would that actually influence how the meat and the milk was then going to taste? And what I focused on because we haven't done the meat yet is the milk. Well, it's a very good question to be asking as the drums beat for different farming systems. So let's have a look at actually what happened here,

16:20or in terms of the testing for flavor and perception of texture and things like that. So there were different pasture species in the mix. How did you go about it? Yeah, that's right. So I'm not a pasture specialist, but our experts here at Massie in Agriculture and Environment they decided to feed cows in this case on three different pastures. The first was what probably a lot of farmers are doing here was a contemporary management on just a ryegrass clover pasture. And that's really the best practice that is recommended. But then they looked at two diverse pastures. Now, those pastures were very diverse. So they had grasses in there, perennial ryegrass, cocks, farts, meadow, fescue, prairie, Persian, lots of legumes, not just white and red clover,

17:20but also looser and other clovers. And then some herbs, some chiquiri and some plantain. So a much more diverse set of green for the cows to munch on. And they managed that pasture either using contemporary methods or regenerative methods. So we had three different sort of fields of cows for them to feed on. And then what we did was we collected the milk from those cows at each stage of lactation. So early mid and late. And we sprayed dried the milk. So we have a big food pilot plant here at Massey. And so we sprayed dried the milk. And then we reconstituted it when we were ready with all our consumers to come and taste it. So they could compare the different milks from the different pastures and at different lactation. So there's a lot of milk and a lot of samples.

18:20And so all we asked the consumers to do was to come in and do what we call a triangle test. It's called a triangle test because there's three samples. Two of them are the same and one is different. So they did triangle tests across all the possible combinations of pastures and all the possible combinations of lactation to see if they could spot the odd one out. That's what we asked them to do. Can you tell which is the odd one out? And then we asked them why did you choose that sample? And if they get it correct, so it's only if they get it correct. Do we look at the terminologies that you were talking about at the start, was one more cardboard than the other? Was one good at taste, more animals and the other and so on? And that's how we got to understand whether with a bit of statistics in there because we use 70 odd people to do the triangle tests. We worked out where we could detect a difference somewhere we couldn't. With those 70 odd people, which ones, well, what was the precincter,

19:24rather, of people that were able to detect something difference? Yes, it's not quite how we do it. It's not a percentage of such. It's based on how many people you have. So we had 69. And you need about 21 to be able to detect the odd sample correctly to be statistically sure that the consumer is going to not detect a difference or detect a difference. So we can say with what we say 95% confident that we're where we could detect a difference between them. And I tasted them myself and I can see what they were saying. Right. So milk from Hood A was most often described as mouth-drying with flavour notes, rancid, cardboard, cow and stale. Milk from Hood B described as sweeter and creamier with flavours associated

20:24with oxidized milk and milk powder. Hood C sour and salty with a milky flavour and dry after taste. So Hood A is racing to be the least desirable ones. Yeah, not quite. So it's quite, there's a subtle difference. What we're saying it was more cardboardy. So it may still have been acceptable. We don't know that yet. That's where we've got to come on to. But for sure, pasture A, which was the contemporary pasture with just the rye glass and crova, was detected as being had more off notes in it than compared to the other two. So the B pasture, which was said to be sweeter and creamier, but did still have some off notes like oxidize or cooked. And the cook comes in because we've sprayed rye the milk, it's not fresh. That was the diverse pasture with regenerative management.

21:25So it did really well. Yeah. And part of this is to see whether the results that people have seen in America with this kind of diverse regenerative practice is the same in New Zealand, because we have different soil obviously. And see which was a slightly sour and saltier and more stringent was still the diverse pasture, but with contemporary management. Now we don't know yet whether these differences are going to impact the consumer. Is it going to make them not want to drink the milk or drink one more than the other? That's the next step. This was the first stage. See, actually, if you can tell the difference and you can. So now we need to move on to see, does that matter to the consumer? Okay. So just to clarify, diverse pasture regeneratively farmed, that was group B. That was who had been, that was the most, that was the creamier stuff.

22:27Well, it was creamier. Yes. Again, I note the nuance in the Saturday. Given the parameters that the study was taking place within, that would seem to be the most desirable of the hoods in terms of their milk output. Possibly. Yeah. Yeah, possibly. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd take creamier over, you know, cardboardy and salty any day, but hey, that's just me. How much did... New Zealand milk is all cardboardy and anomaly to me. I don't like it because I'm from the UK. Where they are different diets. So it's all down to the consumer and whether that's too much for them to take or whether it's fine. Yeah. Right. Okay. That's interesting. Yeah. It is. It's complex. Well, there's very complex. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So in terms of the lactation, then, how did the lactation affect what... What the testers were tasting in relation to those three hoods?

23:30Yeah. I mean, in... There's been lots of studies and we know that there's a big difference in lactation periods between the cows because the milk is being produced for the cough, ultimately, and it's different nutritional needs. And most studies show differences. We didn't see so much difference detected between early and mid lactation. It was that late lactation milk, which is often thinner. So thinner milk, so you're probably getting more of the flavours coming through. You generally find that late lactation milk is more sour and salty, and perhaps has those animal notes, tallow notes in New Zealand. And so they were probably easier to detect during that late lactation period, and those differences would be more obvious between the pastures compared to the early and mid lactation milks. Interesting.

24:30Okay. So where do we go from here? Okay. So what does that tell us then about the... Let's say the regenerative method. It's obviously got some muds, got some legs. Possibly, yeah. Obviously the whole project is looking beyond just the sensory perception of the milk, although ultimately that's going to be important to be to be businesses or consumers. But it's also looking at how the regenerative practices and the diverse pastures impacting the soil are impacting the animal itself. And also impacting the yield and the nutritional value of the milk. So there's a lot of different people working on different aspects of the project to understand what the benefits are at each of the different stages, right, from the roots of the grasses and the legumes through to the animal and through to the consumer.

25:38So at the moment we're seeing positive results in the sensory space. And we need to now see whether the consumer engages with that. Because they'll engage with the messaging as well that comes from perhaps more regenerative, animal friendly, climate friendly, soil friendly, also even the wildlife around regenerative and diverse pastures is probably more diverse than in standard practice. It's kind of going to the whole system rather than just the milk and the yield. It's a different approach. Yeah, no, it definitely is. And yeah, that's an interesting thing from an NZ ink point of view, just thinking more broadly here as well. Yeah, yeah, we have, you know, we already have quite a bit of kudos, particularly in Asia with our milk, you know, perceived as,

26:38even though it's not fresh, fresh and natural, because it's often powdered or UHT treated. But, you know, in that idea of the naturalness for many of our Asian markets is really important to them. And this will just build on that in terms of the farming practices that are carried out here. Yeah. So it's interesting that March is the month for at least consistent milk types. So apparently November and January, milk from those months was found to be relatively similar with each past year type. But the milk produced in March was very different. Yeah, that's the late lactation. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So what you tend to find is that there's a lot of the early milk is very nutrient dense. It'll have more sort of metabolites in there and bioactives in the milk itself,

27:42whereas in the late lactation, it's a much thinner. I mean, it depends what the cow is feeding on. So in our diverse pastures, they were consuming a lot more different bioactive compounds, which then would be transferred into the milk. But also, you see different levels of oxidation of fatty acids in the milk during early versus late lactation. And that gives rise to the different aromas and flavours that you get in the milk anyway. It's very interesting stuff because, yeah, well, for a whole variety of reasons, really. But this is, as you said, at the start part of a much bigger set of data that you're looking to accumulate here. I must be able to fun working in this sort of area. Is it in the whole team together doing various aspects of this kind of work? I think it's fun, but I think it's necessary.

28:42You know, I think I was a conference just a couple of weeks ago, the Red Institute AgriFood Summit. And one of the speakers there was saying that if we fail at food, we fail at everything. And the only way we can understand food is to bring in all of the expertise we have from the different disciplines, from agriculture, horticulture, through to the consumer and sensory science. So yes, it's fun. And it means I get to learn a lot about grass and pasture that I never knew before. I thought a plant lane was a Madonna. So yes, it's fun, but I think from a serious perspective, if we don't understand the whole life cycle of our food products, and we don't understand how it affects the nutritional value, and then the taste for the consumer, then we're not going to be successful. Because you know, we've got a unique position here in New Zealand, but the rest of the world is catching up.

29:42And so we need to make sure that we have that full understanding of the whole production through manufacture to the consumer. And that's what this project is enabling us to do. And specifically, what's your area of expertise? So I'm a sensory scientist, so sort of trained as a food scientist. But sensory science, which is about understanding how people perceive flavor, texture, appearance of food products or how, though those sensory properties interact with the packaging and the messaging that we might give. So that's a bit of psychology. So I'm across between a psychologist and a neuroscientist and a food scientist, which is why that I enjoy cross-disciplinary work. Yeah, it's like when I find bits of apricot and chicken or something like that, or saltana and a salad or something like that, please give me a break already.

30:42So you're the same as me. So at Feast, we're really interested in understanding how different food formulations or food pairings or different ingredients impact how consumers respond and how we respond differently. So I don't do sweet with savory meat like yourself, or saltana's in salads. But some people who are much more, who prefer sweetness, they would really love those combinations. So we're physiologically different. That's why we all have different preferences. And we have arguments over the dinner table as to, you know, why don't you eat that? Oh, I love this. No, it's terrible. All choosing wine, everything. It's because our genetics and our experiences change how we see food. Wow, that's really interesting. Yeah, well, I mean, the saltana people are just playing weird. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I agree. It's interesting when you are sitting around the dinner table

31:43or you say to kids or something, I'll try this. How do you not like it? Why don't you like it? It's like, well, clearly, because people have different palettes and different, you know, reactions to it with all the facets that you've, that you've just mentioned. It's not as simple as going with I like it there for everyone. Correct. Yeah, no, it's very, this is the genetics. It's also children. This is genetic trait, but some children are more near phobic, which means they don't like new foods. And so you take different approaches with children who are near phobic to children who will, who will eat anything, you know, so. Yeah, I raised two of them. Yeah. They've done tomato sauce for about 15 years. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's all down to our genetics and our culture as to what we perceive to be preferable. Yeah. And I, you know, I made a career out of understanding that. So that's what I do. Well, that sounds like, that sounds right. We need to have another chat more.

32:44We do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's amazing, actually. So, it's just one of you, because that's really interesting. When are we going to see this is obviously ongoing. You'll co-late that data and you'll, what's the, you're going to be the time line or anything or. Yeah. So the next study, which is the key one around the consumer preferences of the, of the milks. Obviously, we need to go through a whole new. Sort of round of lactations, so it will be another year or so. probably early 2028 when we've got the final findings and for the rest of the project as well they'll have more findings around that. Well we'll talk before then anyway lovely lovely to have you on the show appreciate your time. You're welcome anytime. Yeah, you should come and visit us at Feast. We're at we're at Feast based. Palmerston North. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. On the campus there. So if you're ever you know traveling

33:44through come and come and seek us it's something to see as well as talk about. Yeah. As regular listeners will know we've tracked the progress of reefed into stilling code almost since its inception. I've been following the story anyway. So when we got an email saying that the CEO Patsy Bass is stepping down from that role we thought we better find out exactly what's going on Patsy it's lovely to have you on how are you? Yeah great thank you Do I'm always nice to connect with you? Yeah we had a few technical difficulties so we've used good old fashioned telephone to connect today but tell me after nine years you've made the decision to step down as chief executive. Yeah and it's an interesting one because in those you know first couple of years where you sort of boots and all doing everything and one of my really respected advisors and mentors said to me just sort of in passing almost that oh yeah and of course you know probably another year or two you won't be the person to lead the business you'll need a different skill

34:44setting I think I was almost a bit missed and I thought what you know I'm so passionate I love this this is me now until you know forever and but it's soon dawned on me that it's different it's different skill sets and experience needed for each stage of the business right and a few years ago I said to the then board you know I think it's time that we get in a CRO to run the business you know the day-to-day business or perhaps a general manager or something and we just went quite in the position to secure with that but you know we've moved on a little bit more now and it's definitely the right time and we didn't even need to go to market we spoke to someone really respected and you know that we absolutely trust and he said this person's not looking but I reckon it would be worth having a chat and made the introduction and it just didn't fell into place over a series of months and that's Lockland Boyle isn't it who is

35:46CFA it picks peanut butter that's right yes informally lion who's you know big beverage brand in New Zealand so yeah so he was more than willing to he had a look at it and thought okay yeah that looks good yeah and he had like a really big look because he wasn't looking like I said and you know we're not he's living in Nelson and so you know there's a lot of moving parts but you know after a number of calls and emails and meetings you know we sort of got there and we're really happy I think we shook hands on the tombs at one meeting and I walked out and booked a whole lot of holidays for the next year what a great what a great thing to do oh I'm so jealous um but yeah you've certainly over uh so we we did it all start because I know that you were overseas and I think you wanted to come back uh and you wanted to give the region a bit of an economic boost or something to hang its head on what give give me the origin story um Patsy so back in 2016 I was living in Christchurch I wasn't overseas

36:50but had my own project management business being you know sort of living the dream for a number of years and but rafedin is my hometown and just you know it's in my DNA and I just had my husband one day I want to go home start a business to help create jobs and bring more people to the region and make the west coast rain sexy and it sort of he I think at first he thought oh you know it's just another idea I have lots of ideas but I think six months later we were we'd um got a house back here and we were rolling our sleeves up and going right what's the business going to be and um the distillery was born yeah why the distillery um because there is a abundant pristine rainfall on the west coast that everyone sees as a negative or many see as a negative from outside the region and we thought how do you make this a really attractive and then with we live in the middle of the largest forest park in New Zealand

37:53over 2000 square kilometres so it's a lot of native botanicals and we thought you could make gin with that but whisky was what sort of really drove us and as an on drinker that can seem a bit old for people but this this was the thing and it seemed to resonate in our little bitty gin pretty quickly we came the number two gin in New Zealand which is a position it's held ever since and we are just on the cusp I'm sitting here with the first box of our Moonlight Creek single malt whisky in my hand which I was going to show you on our video call that you were launching that very soon the ballot for that's live at the moment oh wow how is it just a thousand bottles being released of our single malt yeah well it's a long process it's interesting you mentioned the water there so I was talking with my Scottish correspondent uh from the Contire Peninsula last week and he was saying we were talking about whisky and distilleries and the like and yeah he said look at all about the water he goes people think it's this and it's that

38:56and it's everything else so that perfectly lines up with exactly what you're what you're telling me so it's one of those things where it's not always a fatal complete though that's going to succeed you have this idea okay you've got the botanicals you've got the water you've got the area you've got the idea and the passion for it but that doesn't mean it's going to work so the fact that it has must be very pleasing after this amount of time that's right and you know we weren't expecting pandemics and recessions and you know the world going mad but you know we've just sort of navigated all those blows as they've come in with survived those so yeah we're we're feeling pretty confident for this next chapter and you know spurts are a cyclical thing so they you know one minute ginger then it's not or it's vodka or or whiskey so you just ride those cycles and the good thing with whiskey is if it's in a down cycle you just leave it in the cask and it becomes more valuable every day what what what what are we in now what's the I'm not a huge drinker what's the um what what phase are we in at the moment are we into

39:59whiskeys or vodka's or what oh um so actually gin and whiskey are softening um there's sort of a saturation of gin globally because it's you know low um cost of entry so a lot of people have jumped on that bandwagon we were luckily one of the early ones in New Zealand and then whiskey um you know there was a shortage and so a whole lot of old distilleries were reopened in Scotland and built in India and Japan and that so it you know so when there's a boom and then there's a lot laid down and then it's like oops there's a bit of a recession or something and there's an over supply so then like you know it just yeah so it's a little bit softer at the moment but our whiskey is still new it's only sort of three to four years old so you know it's a few more years yet before we'll have large volumes ready for market so we'll just ride that cycle yeah there isn't as much being drunk at the moment there seems to be something of a lull in consumption yeah and up look I think that's

41:02probably just going to be an ongoing trend as younger people aren't consuming the way perhaps our parents did and but people are sort of the the premiumisation is definitely there so people are spending more drinking less but a better quality they're more choosy about what they're drinking interesting yeah well that makes sense as well so what do you do now are you still part of the business or oh definitely so i mean the business just like rafedin is in my DNA now so i'll always be the founder but i'm moving across so lucky starts with us on the eleventh of may i'll have a couple of months you know helping him find his feet here trying to keep out of his way and from the first of July i reduced my hours which will be nice and i'll be the GM marketing so very much the storytelling the you know the who we are and why we are and the um all of that is the that's what really really drives me so i'm keen in

42:06the businesses keen to keep me in that role i call myself now the number one brand ambassador so i'm a bit of a you know yeah yeah out there sharing the story a walking billboard yeah um so what are you most proud of um maybe it was even just setting the thing up i don't know over the years it's one yeah your product especially little bit he's won a lot of awards there's a few things that were spoken about over the years what do you what do you hang your head on what do you proudest most of with your time at the helm yeah this is where my sort of early social work career kicks and but it's very much doing something people told me i couldn't do and creating jobs for local youth in riefden and seeing the pride and sense of achievement and then when they come into their first job terrified not wanting to make eye contact them within weeks they're just part of the team and they flourish so that that's the bit that i take to my grave is like you know that was worth doing this because it's been

43:08really really hard work at times and i'll never underestimate now well you know i have a respect for other founders knowing the reality of what that means that you know the ares the stress the pressure the joy the whole lot it's a real roller coaster well um well done on this move uh and everything you've achieved up until this point um yeah it's uh been a to hell of a story and it's not over yet so i'm sure we'll be talking again in your guises are the the the head of marketing um so yeah patty lovely to to talk again really appreciate it and uh enjoy your holidays yeah thanks very much Tom always a pleasure to catch up with you in today's rural focus i see the national parties withdrawn its support for resuming live animal exports by sea andrew hoggards saying that the government won't get round to resuming the trade this term as there are more pressing matters uh the government actually did vow to reinstate the trade with new gold standard of animal welfare but it seems like that's gotten

44:11absolutely nowhere and Todd McClay is saying that um if there is a case that could be made where animal welfare could be guaranteed national will read look at it uh but looks like certainly that's not going to be happening anytime soon i can also tell you as well today that Aucklanders can get a taste of the country in their own backyard this weekend Cornwall Park is opening up its working farm uh to establish uh it was established in eighteen forty four currently has about three hundred perendale use and sixty head of cattle the uh farm manager Peter Maxwell says while the public can walk through the farm whenever they like it was opening its gates for farm week and Maxwell's hoping that farm week will encourage an interest in farming for city kids that's a program for today everybody thank you for listening thanks to the contributors thank you to net speed as well from bellclothed Wellington rural sections the big metro's net speeds broad banner phone connections with kiwis everywhere no matter how small your community is net speeds local team will

45:11help you out oh 800 net speed net speed dot net dot in zeds have a great everyone will catch you all back tomorrow from real exchange with net speed outstanding in their field