Mike Bauer heads up Marketing and Business Development at Ranch Systems, based in California. It is a wireless, cloud-based monitoring and reporting system for growers.

The event’s organisers say that Bauer should be a great addition to a strong BNZ Seminar Series line up, which includes Tony Alexander, BNZ Chief Economist, and Professor Hamish Gow from Massey University. The BNZ Seminar Series is a key feature of the National Horticultural Field Day.

Bauer’s technology background working for many years in the fabled Silicon Valley of California is perhaps not the most traditional path into horticulture. However, this knowledge of cutting edge technology and IT has enabled him to solve diverse farming problems across a wide range of crops and across the world with Ranch Systems.

He will use his presentation at the Field Day to showcase the benefits of Ranch Systems’ products such as increase in yield, lowering of operational costs, improvement of crop quality and conservation of water through use of the monitoring software.

The BNZ Seminar Series will start with a breakfast event and keynote address from Professor Hamish Gow of Massey University. Professor Gow is the Director of Business Innovation and Strategy at Massey, and is founder of the Food Safety Knowledge Network and is currently leading the facilitation team assisting the World Bank to establish an open source Global Food Safety Partnership.

Tony Alexander, BNZ Chief Economist, returns to the Field Day to share his wealth of knowledge and Hawke’s Bay Regional Council will be updating on their TANK project.

The Field Day will be held on Friday, 8 July at Showgrounds Hawke’s Bay in Hastings, and is New Zealand’s leading Horticulture-specific event, growing each year with 2016 no different. The strength of the Seminar Series line up shows that this event should be a must-attend for those in the industry.

For more information about the BNZ Seminar Series programme and reserving seats, please contact Events Manager, Anna Hamilton.