WHO WE ARE
Where It All Began.
Greenvale Pastures is our ‘Home of Precision Ag’ and the Mackenzie Family’s Mid Canterbury cropping farm. It’s where our Preicsion Ag journey began as Agri Optics and it continues to play a key role in the evolution now through into Vantage New Zealand. It’s our testing ground for all the ‘latest and greatest’ products to ensure that everything we bring to market is tried and tested and offers real value to our customers.
Because we’re farmers too, we know how important it is that products are adapted for the New Zealand market to fit kiwi farmers needs. We not only have our feet tied to the ground with arable farming, but also dairy and sheep and beef as well, making us well placed to know what pieces of the precision ag puzzle might best suit you, and where to start.
From humble farm beginnings, Vantage NZ has now grown to a team of 11 highly skilled and experienced staff with a passion for NZ agriculture to help you through your Precision Ag journey.
Our journey
Company History
The agrioptics story
Our Beginning
Craige Mackenzie, travelled as a NZ Nuffield Farming Scholar. While travelling around the world on his study tour he gained an insight into a wide range of technologies present throughout the world and how they would fit into New Zealand farming systems. One of the greatest things he saw was the potential to reduce costs, environmental pressure and greenhouse gas emissions through more precise management of inputs. This sparked an interest in some specific products that Craige would then introduce into his family’s own arable enterprise.
In the same year Jemma Mulvihill, Founder & Director, completed a year of ‘Study Abroad’ at Colorado State University as part of her Agricultural Science degree where she undertook papers looking at several aspects of precision agriculture (PA). Here she saw the great potential that PA technology offered in increasing the efficiency and sustainability to farming systems across New Zealand.
Launch of Agri Optics New Zealand
Agri Optics New Zealand Ltd was launched by Craige, Roz and Jemma. The company has developed rapidly due to our ability to provide clients with quality solutions delivering real value. The Agri Optics client base now encompasses arable, dairy, horticulture, pastoral and viticulture along with council infrastructure and amenity management
North Island Branch Established
Agri Optics North was established to provide precision agriculture services to our growing number of clients in the North Island
PGG Wrightson Seeds Partnership
PGG Wrightson Seeds Ltd acquired a 51% shareholding in the company, providing new energy and ideas to Agri Optics NZ and ensuring we have a truly national footprint
100% Ownership of Agri Optics North Ltd
Agri Optics acquired 100% ownership of Agri Optics North Ltd, ensuring that our North Island client base will benefit from the same products and services that their southern counterparts have enjoyed
CB Norwood Form Partnership
CB Norwood Distributors Ltd entered the business with a 33% share
PGG Wrightson Exit
PGG Wrightson sold their shareholding to the remaining partners
Agri Optics Acquired GPS Control Systems
Agri Optics NZ acquired GPS Control Systems Ltd
Agri Optics Rebranded As Vantage New Zealand
Agri Optics became the official New Zealand partner of Trimble’s global Vantage Agriculture network and renamed the business Vantage New Zealand Agricultural Solutions Ltd
Our journey
The Greenvale Story
Roz & Craige MacKenzie - Where it all began
The first foray into Precision Agriculture (PA) began on Mackenzie’s farm near Methven, Greenvale Pastures Ltd.
Greenvale Pastures is an arable farm which has been in the Mackenzie family hands since 1970.
It may be his Scottish ancestry, or it may be his love for the detail but Agri Optics company Founder and Director Craige Mackenzie along with wife, Roz, have always been driven to achieve the best value from every input on Greenvale Pastures. The change from a dryland property in 1998 to become partially irrigated brought with it a wealth of learning for the Mackenzies’ as they discovered how to make the most from every drop of water delivered to the farm.
Their understanding of the productivity of the various soil types across the farm grew. But their ability to apply fertiliser, chemicals or irrigation according to the known soil productivity was limited by access to technology and know-how. There were few in New Zealand working in the PA field.
From Craige’s perspective, apart from the use of Yield mapping from the combine harvester, PA was limited to the larger landmasses of Australia, USA, and Canada where the benefits of GPS could be seen and understood in the use of large tractors with auto-tracking and overlap control. There didn’t seem to be any benefit for the smaller, more intensive farms typical to New Zealand. His NZ Nuffield Farming Study tour in 2008 changed that perception. Since this time Greenvale has embraced the farming technology revolution. Its profitability, productivity, and environmental impact have all improved
Timeline of the adoption of precision agriculture technology at Greenvale:
Greenvale continues to be the key testing ground for PA technologies and services adopted by Vantage NZ. If it doesn’t pass the on-farm test, we won’t be providing it to our clients.