Share Farmers of the Year, Andre and Natalie Meier, at the 2025 Bay of Plenty Dairy Industry Awards.
Share Farmers of the Year, Andre and Natalie Meier, at the 2025 Bay of Plenty Dairy Industry Awards.
Andre and Natalie Meier have been named the Share Farmer of the Year winners at the annual Bay of Plenty Dairy Industry Awards.
The announcement was made at the annual awards dinner at the Awakeri Events Centre last week, where the Meiers won $11,745 in prizes and three merit awards.
The Meiers are in a 20% equity partnership with Bruce and Gill Cameron over two properties at Otamarakau and Otakiri, totalling 267ha and 760 cows.
They chose farming as their career as the mix of working outside with animals and machinery was appealing.
The couple also loved being outdoors and physically active, saying it was a great lifestyle for a young family.
They also saw technology and innovation in the industry growing in the future.
“We already use a lot on-farm but will continue to grow in this area as we are reaching our full potential and it helps with environmental sustainability.”
The couple said they’d like to see a more consistent milk price with less fluctuation to help with future budgeting.
The Meiers cite farming during Covid as one of their biggest challenges.
“We had to implement systems to continue farming and keep our staff safe.”
Significant weather events have also given them challenges to overcome, which they have done by simplifying their farm system to ensure they can ride out any future storms.
“We also changed our system to OAD [once a day milking], which has significantly improved our reproduction results.”
Andre, 35, and Natalie, 33, said diversification, size of business and a solid infrastructure with shared machinery and resources were strengths of their farming business.
“We are able to share staff and skill sets across our two properties, and business diversity in kiwifruit and quarrying also spreads our business and financial risk.
“We have a herd on one farm, which is awesome and a feed pad on the other farm,” they explained.
“We also have a great pool of machinery which we share between platforms, and we’re able to do jobs such as fertiliser application, meaning we don’t need to rely on contractors.”
Future farming goals include debt-funding an increase of their equity shareholding, and improving their herd figures to have an efficient OAD herd.
The Meiers have had previous success at the awards, with Andre winning the 2020 National Dairy Manager of the Year trophy and being named 2020 Bay of Plenty Dairy Manager of the Year.
He believed the awards programme helped his self-development by pushing him outside his comfort zone and by making connections within the industry.
Other award winners
Alana Fitzpatrick, the 2025 Bay of Plenty Dairy Trainee of the Year.
The other big winners were Thomas Lundman, named the 2025 Bay of Plenty Dairy Manager of the Year, and Alana Fitzpatrick, the 2025 Bay of Plenty Dairy Trainee of the Year.
Runners-up in the Bay of Plenty Share Farmer of the Year category were Renee and Benjamin Howard.
Renee was the 2019 Manawatū Dairy Manager of the Year.
The couple is in a 9% equity partnership with John and Leanne Howard, their 89ha Whakatane farm, milking 233 cows.
Renee and Ben credit the awards programme with helping them gain insights into their business and said the feedback from judges allowed them to align their goals to ensure they were on the right path to where they wanted to be.
The couple saw themselves at the forefront of the change into sustainable practices that truly focused on the health of the animal and the land.
“We are already incorporating sustainability practices on-farm and focus more on our animals and land over profit.”
The couple cited their family as a strength of their business.
“We all work well together as a team, and we have flexibility in some of our jobs.
“We have a long-standing business with relatively low debt levels and a focus on future growth, which means there has been a fair amount of capital investment, with room to expand.”
“Winning categories has opened doors for me that I never would have imagined and has given me the confidence that I’m good enough to take the next step.”
Lundman grew up on a dairy farm and worked as a tour guide and team leader for the Te Anau Glowworm caves, greeting over 140,000 people a year, before beginning in the dairy industry in 2020.
“I chose farming as it was a stable job in a not-so-stable time and has a clear path of progression,” he said.
“I look forward to New Zealand leading the way in environmental standards and also in the wearables technology sector.
“I’m most excited about the future that farming could provide for me and my family.
“If I can knuckle down, work hard, then I’ll achieve my goals.”
She was named runner-up in the 2022 Bay of Plenty Dairy Trainee category.
The 27-year-old holds a Bachelor of Agricultural Science from Massey University and worked for Assure Quality in the Mycoplasma Bovis Unit based in Ōamaru after graduating.
She came home to work on the family farm for five seasons and aims to transition into contract milking in the next year or two.
She identified living with dyslexia as a challenge and was proud to have successfully completed her university degree and further study.
“Dyslexia will always be a part of my life, but I’ve learnt to navigate, which has built my confidence.”
Working with her dad as her boss could be tricky at times, trying to distinguish between her role as his daughter and employee.
The 22-year-old works on David and Lesley Jensen’s 240ha, 700-cow property at Tauranga.
Fitzpatrick embraced the new technology available in the industry and enjoyed discovering how it could benefit on-farm systems.
She has a strong passion for the dairy industry and completed the NZ Certificate in Agriculture Level 3 in Farming Systems, Vehicles, Machinery and Infrastructure and Dairy Farming. She is currently studying towards Dairy Farming Level 4.
“One of biggest challenges is not having much confidence in my abilities,” Fitzpatrick said.
“This is improving as I continue to push myself, develop new skills and better my problem-solving abilities.”
The runner-up in the Dairy Trainee category was Adam Manners, who won $2070 in prizes.
The 19-year-old works as a farm assistant on Janelle Nee and Mel McEntyre’s 64ha, 154-cow property at Tauranga.
The first-time entrant had been working in the industry for a year and was excited about the future of agriculture in New Zealand.
“I can see myself learning and growing in this industry.”
Manners is currently studying towards Level 3 PrimaryITO courses and hopes to progress to farm management and ownership.
Third place in the Dairy Trainee category went to Julian Tambourlas, farm assistant on John Fowler’s 90ha, 230-cow Te Puke property.
The Bay of Plenty Dairy Industry Awards winners field day will be held on Monday, April 7, at 10am on 313 Otamarakau Valley Rd, Te Puke 3186 S/N Fonterra 21659, where the Meiers are equity partners.
