Federated Farmers’ president Andrew Hoggard has stepped down from the top role early to contest this year’s election as the ACT party’s Rangitīkei candidate. Andrew Hoggard’s term was due to end in a couple of months and he said he was gutted to leave early but it was in the federation’s best interest to announce plans now. Andrew Hoggard says farming is down in the dumps and he hopes to give the sector a strong voice in Parliament. Hoggard joined Federated Farmers 18 years ago, was the dairy section chair before three years as vice president. He described the president’s role as being “quite a slog”, and the real highlight of his time came more from being dairy section chair.
National’s Agriculture spokesperson Todd McClay says he was not concerned that Hoggard was joining ACT rather than National. He said he had a lot of respect for Hoggard, but “he’s the third leader of Feds to join ACT over a period of time, looks like there’s a bit of a pattern there. Federated Farmers vice president Wayne Langford will be acting president until the national annual general meeting in July.