For the first time in over a year economic growth prospects have been revised upwards, an economic think-tank says.

An orchid grower driven to desperation after losing his entire crop and income to a new spray dumped thousands of his flowers in a public protest.

Farmer owners of the country's biggest company, Fonterra, have been asked to come up with the cash they forbid directors to go to the sharemarket for.

Dairy giant Fonterra is poised to unveil its second proposal for capital structure reform within days.