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Speaker 1: Now the government zeroing in on Land Corp as an

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Speaker 1: example of state owned enterprises that are underperforming. Its singled

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Speaker 1: out a number of SOEs that it says has performed poorly.

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Speaker 1: This is Treasury over the last five years and the

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Speaker 1: worst performers are New Zealand Post met Service, Cordier and

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Speaker 1: Land Corp. LANDCRP was also criticized for the big pay

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Speaker 1: package of its chief executive. The CE couldn't come on

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Speaker 1: the show tonight, but we have Will Burrett, the Chief

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Speaker 1: operating Officer of Land Corp.

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Speaker 2: Hi, Will good right here, Thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: Thank you. Do you think that CEO pay or CE

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Speaker 1: pay should go up when profits fall as dramatically as

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Speaker 1: your profit has?

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Speaker 2: I look, I'm not here to talk about my boss

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Speaker 2: as a salary, But what do we talk about it?

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Speaker 1: Just hypothetically, let's say, any old, any old soe. Should

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Speaker 1: the performance of the CE be tied to the performance

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Speaker 1: of the of the SOE?

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Speaker 2: Well, look, I think that's that's for a matter of

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Speaker 2: the board to work with a CE. I'm here to

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Speaker 2: talk about our performance and where we're heading moving forward.

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Speaker 1: Tell me about your performance, good or bad.

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Speaker 2: Look, we've been on the journey to be honest either,

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Speaker 2: and that's pretty cliche, but you know, I'm really proud

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Speaker 2: of the last eight en months and where the business

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Speaker 2: has just laser focused on on core business principles of

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Speaker 2: you know, animals, pasture, wastage and and internal optimizations. So

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Speaker 2: you know, we've we've we've come a long way. We've

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Speaker 2: focused on our structure, on our systems and the performance

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Speaker 2: culture that I think we're a ready starting to embed

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Speaker 2: some really good things.

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Speaker 1: And if you focused on doing your business properly, what

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Speaker 1: have you got rid of?

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Speaker 3: There wasn't part of that, I think just noise, you know,

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Speaker 3: I think we have Well, look, we've we've gone back

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Speaker 3: to basics. If I'm honest, you know that we're not

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Speaker 3: the only agricultural entity over the last wee while it's

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Speaker 3: had to reset itself, focused capital allocation back to the core,

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Speaker 3: strip away some noise from the business and well look

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Speaker 3: it's it's actually just focusing on the core principles of farming.

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Speaker 3: So going back to basics.

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Speaker 1: Making sure where have you stripped away?

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Speaker 2: Well, look, we've focused on putting capital back into the business.

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Speaker 2: Heather and not.

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Speaker 1: Told you has somebody told you not to give specifics?

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Speaker 2: No, not at all?

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Speaker 1: Do you not know what?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we have stripped away noise, so and what is I'm.

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Speaker 1: Just going to try one more time and then I'm

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Speaker 1: going to give up. What is that noise?

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Speaker 2: But we've we've focused capital back into behind farm gate

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Speaker 2: rather than post farm gate, so we've we've reduced you know,

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Speaker 2: palming food, that's that's been consolidated down and where we

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Speaker 2: are driving you know, the other areas of those post

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Speaker 2: post farm gate investments harder. But then behind farm gate,

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Speaker 2: which is the bulk of the investment in the asset

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Speaker 2: across the two billion assets were focused on driving physical

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Speaker 2: performance which we can control and we can control costs.

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Speaker 1: Do you still milk deer?

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Speaker 3: Yes? We do?

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Speaker 1: Is that a good idea?

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Speaker 2: I'll look, that's something that you know, you ask around

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Speaker 2: the purpose of PAMU and we are here to try

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Speaker 2: and challenge some things.

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Speaker 1: See the problem though, isn't it will because a normal

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Speaker 1: father farmer is not going to faff around milking deer,

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Speaker 1: are they They're just going to get on with doing

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Speaker 1: sheep and beef and dairy. And do you think maybe

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Speaker 1: is that part of the problem that what we think

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Speaker 1: you are is the government's farmers? But what you think

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Speaker 1: you are is experimenting.

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Speaker 2: We've got to put a percentage of the asset that

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Speaker 2: we've got into things that are going to trial and

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Speaker 2: test system designs and potentially new horizons. Are you forced that?

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Speaker 1: Are you forced through through legislation to do that?

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Speaker 2: We are forced to make sure that we're driving a return,

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Speaker 2: and that's what we're focusing on.

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Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, Well, are you forced through legislation or

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Speaker 1: through regulation, or through any kind of rule to put

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Speaker 1: a percentage of what you are doing into you know, experimenting?

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Speaker 2: I'd say, we are trying to help the industry and

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Speaker 2: seeking you. Okay, that's these things, So you're.

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Speaker 1: Just doing that wacky stuff of your own. Bat Now,

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Speaker 1: we had we had Grant McCallum on who you'll be

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Speaker 1: aware of as a farmer himself but also National Party MP.

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Speaker 1: So let's be honest, right, he's got some skin in

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Speaker 1: the game here. They're obviously lining you people up to

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Speaker 1: sell you down, so he's doing he's doing the government's

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Speaker 1: job here, but he reckons that you guys should be

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Speaker 1: providing a net operating profit of maybe minimum one hundred

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Speaker 1: milli but you know, closer to two hundred million and

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Speaker 1: it's only twenty mil So how how do you explain that?

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Speaker 2: Well, we've we've positioned a record profit coming out this

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Speaker 2: financial year of between forty one and fifty one million.

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Speaker 2: That'll be firmed up and later later of August, I

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Speaker 2: think late August will be confirming that. And then we've

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Speaker 2: we've got an sci that we were or a statement

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Speaker 2: of corporate intent which is effectively our budget hither over

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Speaker 2: the next three years that we'll be landing with the

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Speaker 2: Minister later on this month, so that paint paints the pathway,

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Speaker 2: and that pathway speaks directly to focus back on the

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Speaker 2: core business. So you know, I'll probably let those numbers

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Speaker 2: speak for themselves when they come out.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Well, thank you, appreciate your time. That's Will Burrett,

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Speaker 1: the chief operating officer of Land Corp. For more from

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Speaker 1: Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news talks. It'd

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Speaker 1: be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.