Administration Professionals Day Celebration - 21 April @ 6pm
We would love administrators (including EA's, receptionists, finance and payroll staff) across Palmerston North and Manawatu to join us at The Verdict Cafe, to acknowledge their role and the value they add to the success of the organisations the work for. Does this sound like you? Or are you a manager who would like to acknowledge your administrator/s? We'd like you to come along.
The key note speaker will be Sharon Dagg who will speak on "Overcoming Adversity" and recently become the first woman amputee to complete the Coast-to-Coast multi-sport event and will inspire us to move ahead despite the challenges that come our way.
Drinks and hors d'oeuvres, fabulous food and great spot prize draws throughout the evening!
Great news! Ticket sales extended out to Sunday 18 April (limited to available capacity)!
Go to www.eventbrite.co.nz...
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The evening will be a great success due to our amazing APDAY21 sponsors. Special thanks to theverdictcafe.co.nz... for providing us with a beautiful venue and food, www.manawatunz.co.nz... and www.edenoffice.co.nz... for supplying an office chair for the Member of the Year 2021 Award, www.floralcollaborative.co.nz... for gorgeous flowers and to the wonderful www.facebook.com..., a health coach who will "ignite your sparkle"!
Share your favourite main crop potato recipe and win a copy of our mag!
Love potatoes? We will give away free copies of the May 2026 issue to readers whose potato recipes are used in our magazine. To be in the running, make sure you email your family's favourite way to enjoy potatoes: mailbox@nzgardener.co.nz, by March 1, 2026.
SLASH BESIDE THE TRACK UP TO TRIG
I question the wisdom and the morality of an industry which creates so much waste, waste which is also a cause of widespread and devastating damage. So, I searched the internet for potential uses of slash. It was easy to find.
I recommend a visit to nzbioforestry.co.nz. I quote from the website:
OUR SOLUTION:
NZ Bio Forestry proposes to develop a sustainable renewable forestry model that increases the economic value of the NZ- Aotearoa forestry sector, simply by integrating bio-technologies augmenting the forestry, wood manufacturing, and petrochemistry industries into one model.
Specifically, our strategy is to utilise the whole tree and convert the tree’s sugars into bioenergy, biomaterials, and biochemicals. This means using slash, off cuts, pruning, and wood waste to produce biofuel via bio pellets and biochemicals. It means optimising logs through the whole process….logging, manufacturing freighting, and refining process to serve the many Asia-Pacific markets with high-value products….not just exporting raw logs to one or two large dominant markets! (End of quote)
NZ Bio Forestry then contrasts the financial return from the present exports of raw logs with the potential return from utilising the WHOLE TREE.
In US dollars, the return from exporting logs is between $50 - $140 per log.
Using the whole tree including the slash and other waste for wood processing would return $200 - $800 per tree, and,
Using the bio-refinery process to convert the wood waste into fossil-free biochemicals would return $2,500 - $11,200 per tree.
I can’t help but conclude that our current focus on exporting logs is a pitiful failure of industry and government policy compared with the potential benefits of processing THE WHOLE TREE. And to complete the argument, this not just theory. In Scandinavia, SCA, which owns Europe’s largest private forest with 2.7 million hectares, has built a well-invested value chain that maximises the value of each individual tree and all of the forestry’s resources.
A SUMMARY OF POTENTIAL ADDITIONAL PRODUCTS:
Wood Pellets and Chips: Slash can be collected, dried, and processed into hog fuel or wood pellets for use in industrial boilers, as a replacement for coal, to generate heat and electricity.
Biofuel Production: Research is underway to convert forest residues into marine biofuel to help decarbonize the shipping sector.
Gasification: Advanced, small-scale, on-site processing plants can turn slash into renewable energy products like bio-oil, ethanol, and hydrogen.
Biochemicals: Specialized refineries can convert woody waste into sustainable alternatives to plastics, chemicals, and industrial products.
WAKE UP Aotearoa, New Zealand!!!
🧩😏 Riddle me this, Neighbours…
I am an odd number. Take away a letter and I become even. What number am I?
Do you think you know the answer?
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