Town met country on Friday (July 28), with Fenwick School pupils visiting two North Otago farming operations.

The year 3 and 4 pupils have been studying an enterprise unit, and the most recent focus was “enterprise within our rural community”, Fenwick teacher and syndicate leader Renee Webster said.

“So really along the lines of farming,” she said.

North Otago Sustainable Land Management (Noslam) engagement officer Nic Neal came on board to help facilitate the learning, and connected them with North Otago farmers Richard Plunket and Andrea Ludemann.

“The idea was to get urban kids out on farms, and we’ve got some really cool sustainable land users, sustainable food producers, so it’s just a great opportunity and a great time of year with lots of things happening,” Nic said.

The 93 children split into two groups. One spent the morning with Troy and Erin Wilson, sharemilkers on Banarach Farm, Hilderthorpe, which is owned by Richard and Andrea; while the others were at the couple’s Boundary Creek sheep and beef farm, to see some of the ins and outs of that operation. 

Then groups came together at Banarach for a lunch provided by BX Foods, and to watch a Fonterra tanker collect some milk, before swapping over in the afternoon.

Renee said the school group had also visited small animal food producer Topflite, and looked at its seeds, cropping and other operations.

“So we started with that, and then transitioned into the sheep, beef and dairy. We feel Very spoiled that we’ve been able to come out to these farms, and they’ve opened it up for us.” 

More than half of the children and never stepped on a farm before last week’s visit, she said.

Nic said Noslam appreciated it was not as easy for more urban schools to connect with local food producers, and she was happy to help.

“That seems a win-win for us. It’s just a great opportunity to bring little consumers and food producers together,” she said.

Along with BX Foods providing lunch for the children, Fonterra had provided products, and Dairy NZ had donated cookbooks to show the children things they could make using dairy.