Dairy Farmer and Chairman of Tatua Co-operative Dairy Ltd
Steve Allen is a fourth generation farmer, whose family has been supplying the Tatua Co-operative Dairy Company since the 1920's. Tatua is located at Tatuanui, 35 km east of Hamilton and is one of New Zealand's oldest dairy co-operatives having been in business for 95 years.

It is by philosophy and design a niche operator, with the milk from its small tight-knit supplier base of 112 farms being collected and processed into high value added products destined for well defined and carefully targeted markets.

Steve has been actively dairy farming since 1993, having spent some formative years with IBM New Zealand Limited, servicing the grocery industry. He has been a director of Tatua for fourteen years and the Chairman for the past six.

In addition to his Chairmanship of Tatua, Steve is a past director of the New Zealand Dairy Board (during the time of the formation of Fonterra), and a former director of Livestock Improvement Corporation Ltd. His other interests include working on the Board of Governors for an Independent Secondary School, and as a Trustee for a Charitable Trust.

Steve's farming interests include running two family farms at Tatuanui, milking approximately 700 cows. He and his wife are also shareholders in a partnership with some other families who farm together at Geraldine in South Canterbury.

Steve is also a current director of Genetic Technologies Limited, the producer and distributor of Pioneer^® brand seeds in New Zealand.

Look forward to Steve sharing his experiences and views on the current state and outlook for the global dairy market, together with the risks and opportunities for the New Zealand industry and its dairy farmers in the changing global economic environment.