David Bedford - Chairman

David is a Waipara grape grower. The Bedford family have been developing a small riesling vineyard on land on Georges Road since 2005.  

Prior to this David was a senior executive with Telecom New Zealand based in Wellington and Sydney, where he was Chief Operating Officer of the Telecom subsidiary AAPT.

During 10 years with Telecom David also had time as Head of Human Resources and Group General Manager Network.

Ron van Til - Trustee

Having owned Rangiora Bakery for some 20+ years now and having invested about $15m into land and buildings in the Waimakariri District, it would be fair to say Ron has a vested interest in both the business community and the people of Rangiora.  Ron currently employs about 140 staff who mostly live in the Waimak area and has supply contracts with most leading Multinational companies like McDonalds, Starbucks, BP and Air NZ as well as a strong retail presence in Rangiora under the branding of Artisan. 

Ron is a member of the National ITO board of Bakery Training and has also been on the executive with the Baking Society.  From a personal development perspective, Ron is part of the Icehouse Alumni having completed a Owner Manager Program through the Auckland Business School.

david ayers

10, November 2010

David Ayers- Trustee

David is the Mayor of Waimakariri.

He was born and brought up in Christchurch but has roots in the Woodend-Rangiora area going back into early colonial times.  

After gaining an MA in History and a Diploma of Education at the University of Canterbury, he entered the teaching profession, eventually to become Assistant and/or Deputy Principal at Cashmere and Rangiora High Schools.

He has lived in Rangiora since 1976 and first entered local government in 1983, winning a seat on the Rangiora Borough Council.  Since then he has completed seven terms and is Waimakariri’s longest-serving councillor since the 1989 reorganisation of local government. David regards the Waimakariri District as his main hobby, but also enjoys reading history, following cricket and driving his classic Ford Corsair.

Winton Dalley- Trustee

Winton is a merino farmer with a history of working for his community is the new Mayor of Hurunui. Winton Dalley has been running a successful farming operation in the dry hills of North Canterbury for more than three decades.  Winton also has a long history in local government in the Hurunui, including 18 years as a Ward committee member and six years on Council. He was instrumental in developing the Hurunui Water Strategy, and was appointed the inaugural council representative on the fledgling Hurunui-Waiau Zone Water Management Committee.  Winton Dalley vision for Hurunui as "a healthy, prosperous, and spiritually contented community" where retaining Hurunui's rural character and values would remain important to him.

Jim Lee - Trustee

Jim Lee is the Chief Executive and a shareholder of FarmRight Limited, a private company specialising in investment management and consultancy in the dairy farming sector.

FarmRight has a direct staff of 20 and is responsible for an additional 300 farm staff on the 43 dairy farming businesses it manages throughout New Zealand. FarmRight’s activities include capital raising, investment promotion, farm development, operational and financial management, and technical farm consultancy.

Jim has direct investments in the dairy industry and holds three directorships in private companies.

Jim is married to Anne, has three children aged 16, 14 & 12 and enjoys hunting, fishing & multisport.

Nick Harris - Trustee

Nick was born and raised in the North Canterbury district.  Cheviot was his home for his early years and he continues to have strong ties to this area with a half shareholding in Harris Meat (Cheviot) Ltd with brother Bryan. They process and sell from their Abattoir near Domett.

In 1993 together with Todd Heller and two other partners they started Heller Tasty Ltd at its current site just north of the Waimakariri Bridge. Nick is now Managing Director and the company employs approximately 400 staff on two sites, Kaiapoi and in Auckland.

Although business keeps him busy he still enjoys spending time with his family and takes an active part in sports through their involvement in hockey and golf.

Ross Seagar - Trustee 

Jim Palmer - Advisory Trustee

Jim is the Chief Executive of Waimakariri District Council.  Appointed to the position five years ago, he is responsible for providing advice to the Council, and giving effect to the Council’s decisions.  The Council is responsible for $1 billion of assets, and has an annual turnover in excess $50 million. 

For two years prior to this time he was the Council’s Manager, Finance and Business Support.  Before joining the Council Jim was a Director with Audit New Zealand responsible for auditing a wide variety of public sector organisations. 

He enjoys spending time with his family, gardening, travel and occasionally taking his golf clubs for a walk.

Andrew Dalziel - Advisory Trustee

Andrew is the CEO of the Hurunui District Council.  His principal role is working with the elected members to set the Council’s direction and then leading the organisation to deliver on that agreed direction. 

Before taking up the role in 2007, Andrew held a number of senior positions at Wellington City Council.  He has a Master of Commerce Degree in Economics passed with distinction from Otago University.

Ben Kepes - Trustee

Ben’s background is in business in varied industries from manufacturing to property to technology.  He’s also built a significant online presence -  He’s a blogger and evangelist for cloud computing generally and software as a service specifically - most notably as editor of CloudAve.com, the preeminent location for Cloud Computing commentary.  He’s an advisor to early stage companies and a board member and consultant. He writes for physical publications, blogs and consults from a small farm in rural North Canterbury, New Zealand. Check out his blog http://diversity.net.nz/