Comment: Robots, trees and pushbikes - farming's 'bright' future

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COMMENT: Manawatu farmer Pete Fitz-Herbert takes a tongue in cheek look at the future of New Zealand agriculture.

The future is bright.

There is so much negativity around at the moment I thought I would look forward positively to the bright future that awaits New Zealand.

Imagine a country where you can ride your bicycle to the closest hospital to give birth.

Then to save some more of the environment and be a part of the zero waste movement, your first and only hospital meal containing meat is your own gently seared placenta with a pinch of pink Himalayan salt and julienne carrots.

In the future our weekends are full of road trips limited only by the battery life of your EV, out into no-man's land, (formally known as rural New Zealand) to stare at the locked gate of a forestry block that once contained a farm with a swimming hole, that now apparently contains pristine water (but the foreign owners don't visit, so actually, who would know?!)

Why just on your weekends though?

A future that is filled with automation in the workplace is coming, because minimum wages are forced so high it was justifiable to release the workforce from the burden of employment and invest in some robotics (and everyone loves a robot).

With your week days being employment free, you will be able to do as you please.

I don't know about you, but I'm getting excited. That sounds like a Utopia.

I'm frothing at the bit.

Yep, jobs for robot, trees for foreigners, and placenta for dinner.

I haven't even had the chance to consider our clean green cannabis industry, I will be grinning from ear to ear.

So stay positive guys, I'm sure we will get some more magical ideas excreted out of Wellbeington soon.

- Pete Fitz-Herbert is a Manawatu farmer and former finalist in the FMG Young Farmer of the year contest.