Concerns are today being raised over ENZA's decision to give growers just over half of the $27 million it recently received for the sale of its Frucor Beverage business.

ACT Rural Spokesman Owen Jennings said it's ominous ENZA is now talking of only paying out $15 million of the $27 million it received from the sale. "Growers urgently need this money. It will be the difference between bankruptcy or survival for some," he said.

"Growers will be alarmed to learn that ENZA is holding back some $12 million of growers own money. Where is it going? Growers have a much greater need of propping up their own balance sheets than ENZA.

"That money should be back in growers pockets. It should not be spent on overseas jaunts or grandiose schemes like the white elephant in Napier and the Chilean debacle.

"ACT believes growers should get more of the proceeds from the Frucor sale- and get them urgently. Why not all the net return paid out as soon as the Bill is law. The Bill going through Parliament will allow for this to happen," said Owen Jennings.

ENDS

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>