Firms wanting to use te reo in their branding should check with Te Hamua Nikora as well as IPONZ

Learning Māori is first and foremost about having fun, according to Precious Clark, director of Maurea Consulting LTD, in a Newshub report on learning te reo Maori and embracing tikanga.

“It’s about giving people the tools so they can pronounce our words correctly and it’s about giving them the confidence to give it a go,” she said.

But getting it right isn’t always easy,  Newshub’s Mike McRoberts pointed out.

His report recalled the recent experience of a Canadian brewery which apologised after making a beer with New Zealand hops which it called the Pale Ale Huruhuru.

“The strict translation means feather, but it’s more commonly used to describe pubic hair. 

“After being called out by language watchdog Te Hamua Nikora, the brewery apologised.”

The beer company wasn’t alone.  A leather shop in Wellington apologised, too, after coming under fire for unwittingly taking its name from the Māori word “huruhuru”.

Yes, you can win IPONZ approval for your branding but it’s back to the drawing board if some Māori mount an offensive against you

The makers of the gin once branded “indiginous”  announced early in June they were back in business and their product – now known as “imagination” – was available again, in stores and online.

Since then their Facebook page has recorded that whatever it’s called, the hand-crafted gin they make in the Reikorangi Valley, near Waikanae, has gone down a treat with the experts. They were awarded a silver medal and the highest score for a New Zealand gin at the London Spirits Competition; a gold, a silver and two bronze medals at the New Zealand Spirits Awards; and a bronze medal at the International Wine & Spirit Competition in the UK.

The most recent post, on August 18, advised:   

“A very satisfying way to end the medal season! We won our very first medal with our very first gin at the 2019 SIP Awards in the USA, and we’ve gone back to back with another Gold medal for our Triple Distilled Dry Gin for 2020.”

Another of their gins picked up Silver. 

But it has been a harrowing year.

Faafoi is far from helpful when asked how business people can avoid being accused of causing cultural offence

The makers of Indiginous gin had a sobering experience after getting the approvals they thought they required from this country’s trade marking and branding authorities.  Their brand name was approved and they went to market with the gin they make at Reikorangi Valley on the Kapiti Coast, only to be intimidated into rebranding and remarketing their product by people who barraged them and their retail outlets with a campaign of abuse and threats.

The owners of a Wellington shop which called itself Huruhuru were reported to have been similarly bombarded with abuse and threats after it emerged the name of their business could mean pubic hair.

The owners of the shop, Aynur and Ercan Karakoc, said they had wanted a name to represent New Zealand and had gone through the proper process without any issues arising.  They say the brand name was approved by IPONZ’s Māori Advisory Committee and they assumed therefore it would not be offensive.

Thus the principals of two businesses – at least – have been harassed and accused of causing cultural offence despite seeking the proper authorisations from the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand (IPONZ) and consulting its Maori Advisory Committee.

It’s the beta-casein and premium product that makes a big difference between a2 Milk and Fonterra

Investors  this week took  the  phenomenal result  for a2 Milk   in  their  stride, but  it  may have produced  a few blinks  round   the   nation’s  dairy farms,  particularly  with  the  farmer-suppliers  of  Fonterra. 

Take – for example – a2 Milk’s  earnings  per share  of  52.39c  and contrast them with Fonterra’s 17c per share  in 2019,  or  its  net  profit  of $385.8m   versus  Fonterra’s loss  of $605m.

There  are  other  mind-blowing  figures  from  a2 Milk: total revenue  of  $1.73bn, up  32.8%; ebitda of $549.7m, a  rise of 32.9%;  and operating cash flow of $427.4m. Not to  mention  a  cash  mountain  it has  built up of  $854.2m.

As  one commentator has  put it, a2 Milk with its record growth intrinsically linked to the China market, is a success story   New Zealanders should both celebrate and learn from.

Even  its  Dunedin founders through its  early  years  from 2000,  Dr  Corrin McLachlan  and  Howard  Paterson, might be  astonished  at  its  latest  result.

F&P Healthcare’s increased profit shows Covid-19 has a bright side (for some) but big spending on R&D pays off, too

Covid-19  is  a  disaster   for the US, and  for many other countries — but  it has sent revenues  for Auckland-based F&P Healthcare soaring.  Investors in the  company  were  ecstatic  this  week   when the    company  posted  a  boomer  profit of   $287m  and  forecast  an even better  one  in the current year.  The share price has soared 102%  in the  past 12  months.

It’s  a  performance  the  country as  a  whole  should  celebrate,  for  more than  80% of the  revenue  is  in  US  dollars.

Operating revenue was $1.26bn, up 18% over last year.  Net profit rose 37% over the previous year.

The increase in revenue was largely driven by growth in the use of the company’s OptiflowTM nasal high flow therapy, demand for products to treat Covid-19 patients, and strong hospital hardware sales throughout the year.

How a crash (of sorts) might come

History looks for a trigger for the economy crashing:  the 1929 stock market panic, the 1970s oil shock or the 2008 subprime meltdown.  But while the headline events can be a catalyst, sober analysis usually gives a more complex backstory of growing economic imbalances and disastrous-with-hindsight policy settings.

So casting the Covid shock as the proximate cause, what might be underlying drivers of a sustained deterioration in the economic climate?

A2 Milk continues to experience strong revenue growth as consumers change behaviour

At  a  time  when  the  Covid-19 pandemic  is wreaking  havoc on lives and livelihoods,   and  sage   economists are telling us  the economic slump underway is “truly enormous”,  it is   almost  impossible   to  find   any  chinks of  light in  the encircling gloom.

ANZ economists  say the  pandemic has

 “  … stopped the global  economy   in its tracks  and the impacts of this crisis will be with us in months and years to come”.

Not  good  news  for  an  economy  which  is  already  feeling the effects of the  crash of  two  its  main export-earning  props.

But, wait,  what  about  the  bulletin   from    A2  Milk  on  Wednesday?

The company  which last provided  an update on  its trading performance on  February 27 reported  that, since then,  it has continued to experience strong revenue growth across all key regions, particularly for infant nutrition products sold in China and Australia.

“We are now able to confirm that our revenue for the three months to  March 31 (3Q20) was above expectations. This primarily reflected the impact of changes in consumer purchase behaviour arising from the Covid-19 situation and included an increase in pantry stocking of our products particularly via online and reseller channels. We are unable to estimate the timing and extent to which pantry stocking may unwind.

After the pandemic we must deal with global recession – but there will be corporate opportunities, too

New Zealand  businesses  which  found themselves looking into the abyss of a largely moribund economy  can  now  lift   their  vision  towards  revival,  as  the   government  signals  the  move  into  lockdown level  three.

To a  degree   the vision is still clouded:  one of  NZ’s  biggest   enterprises,  Fonterra,  has  warned  its farmer-suppliers  of the imminent global recession,  which  it  foresees   will  extend  deep  into  2021, while calling on  them  to  be  “cautious”   with    their on-farm   decisions.

Fonterra chairman John  Monaghan  says the global recession will impact people’s purchasing power and that will be reflected in prices for all products and services.

“The scale of the impact is impossible for economists to predict right now.”

Clearly,  it won’t be easy, nor speedy, to recover  from the  lockdown,  and the  impact of the pandemic.

Blis gets a lift as Covid-19 builds the public’s hunger for immune-boosting products

One of the  phenomena  of the  Covid-19  outbreak  has  been   the  sudden  urge  of  people  to  strengthen  their  immune systems.    Products carrying an immune-boosting value have been  in  strong demand.

The  consequence  for  a  Dunedin  company,  Blis  Technologies, is that   since  February  it has  more than   doubled  its output.

Blis Technologies,   which  holds a  world-first  patent  for  the  strain of  oral bacteria, Streptococcus  salivarius ,  was  founded  in 2000  by  Professor John  Tagg,  whose lifelong studies in  microbiology stemmed from having rheumatic fever as a teenager.

That led to his researching helpful bacteria that might be harnessed to fight disease-causing bacteria,  culminating   in the production of a  range of  probiotics.

Clinical studies have shown that probiotic therapy can be used to improve immune health and keep harmful pathogens at bay.

Part 2: The economics and politics of coronavirus are hard to discern but may surprise

So to be clear, at this stage not much is clear.  But it’s surely possible to draw out a few facts and try to isolate what might emerge as significant.

Point one: We can be reasonably sure that there will be a large fall in measured economic output.

This will capture the changes in our collective economic behaviour, both voluntary changes in response to events, and those mandated by governments. Think restaurant meals uneaten, movies not watched, flights not taken, bungees not jumped, houses not painted, and so forth. Some things postponed, some gone for ever.