8 May 1986 Bledisoe Medallist awarded to Ian Hartley Jenkinson

Mr Ian Hartley Jenkinson is the Lincoln College Bledisloe Medalist for 1986, and was given the award at the graduation ceremony at the college today (Friday May 9 ).

The Bledisloe Medal Citation was delivered at the ceremony by the president of the Lincoln College Old Students Association, Mr Graeme Malden.

The medal, named after a former Governor-General of New Zealand, is awarded each year to a past student of Lincoln College who has materially assisted farming, or has otherwise advanced the interests of the country.

BLEDISLOB MEDAL CITATION 1986
Ian Hartley Jenkinson

The Bledisloe Medal goes this year, for only the second time in its 56 years, to an industrial manager. Lord Bledisloe established it in 1930 to acknowledge the contribution of the Old Student who, by virtue of the education received here, had made the greatest contribution to agriculture. It has subsequently been awarded to farmers, to scientists, to economists and to teachers, but it was only two years ago that the first award was made to an industrial manager. A change is indeed occurring in agriculture and today's award is a further recognition that it is served also by those who process and market its outputs.

Ian Jenkinson began his association with the agricultural sector when he was selected as a Rural Field Cadet in 1946. After practical work and courses at both Massey and Lincoln he was awarded a Diploma in Valuation and Farm Management in 1950 and, after a short period of Government service, began his life-long association with the meat industry.

He commenced that career with R & W Hellaby Ltd where he was appointed to oversee farm operations and development on its Parata Farm enterprise. In 1968 he made a significant move from livestock to engineering when he was given control of the design and construction of a new beef cutting room at the Shortland works. That task was marked by attributes that have come to characterise Ian Jenkinson's subsequent career - diligent attention to detail and a hardnosed attitude to cost-cutting.

In 1969 he became Assistant General Manager of Buttons Ltd in Hamilton and devoted a great deal of his time to product innovation and development and to effective quality control and marketing.

In 1972 Ian began what was to prove to be the most significant phase of his business life when he took over as General Manager of the Primary Producers' Cooperative Society - an organisation then in weak industrial health and with few resources other than dreams. In the intervening years he has made those dreams into realities. The Cooperative has been led into rapid but healthy growth; it has invested heavily in further processing with a multi-million cutting plant currently under construction in Dunedin; it has acquired a controlling interest in one of the Country's largest freezing works, the Canterbury Frozen Meat Co. Ltd and it has been the root from which other groups and ventures have sprung.

He has also served the industry on a wider front - as a member of the meat industry task force and director of companies engaged in researching both new markets and new products. His inputs into the strategy formulation of the meat exporters have been of great benefit to the whole sector - not just to PPCS. The positions he has held give some idea of the breadth of his contribution; Chairman of the N.Z. Lamb Co. Ltd; Chairman and Director of the Canterbury Frozen Meat Co. Ltd; Managing Director of the Apex Group Ltd; Director of R. & W. Hellaby Ltd; of Shortland Exports and the Fortex Group.

As a manager he has not sought the limelight - rather he has concentrated on building and retaining a loyal and hard-working staff and on'developing effective marketing strategies. That he has succeeded may be gauged by the fact that the PPCS has grown dramatically and has, in the last five years alone, rebated some $30,000,000 to producer members.

It was the great management consultant and writer Lyndall Orwick who noted that businesses are made or broken in the long-run not by capital or markets, patents or equipment - but by men'. Ian Jenkinson has been one of those to have made a business and in so doing has contributed greatly to agriculture in New Zealand. The award of the 1986 Bledisloe Medal is fitting recognition of that achievement.