Ann: SML Announcement - Supreme Court Update, page-293

I've had another crack at the covenant land and used your picture above. What I have done this time is taken the Stuart coveted land - because that gives me a 1.72 hectare plot.

I've then overlaid that 1.72 hectares of Synlaits land and Stuarts land.

I've then colored the Stuarts and Synlait covented land green - to show you what it looks like if it was kept as lifestyle grazing.

I've then added in the Bowater land - also coloured green because this also has a covenant on it which is beneficial to Mr Ye.

There is also a wee strip of land running down MacDonald road. As this was also originally covenanted land i have coloured that green as well.

From this what we can clearly see is that Mr Ye has a defensive green space moat between his land and Yashili, heading up to Winston Nutritional and eventually Pokeno.

Now we need to wind the clock back to July 2013. The land started getting carved up and joined together. The Stuart land was carved off and joined with a bit of Cleaver land. When it did, it kept the covenant on that 1.7 hectare land. So a 1.7 h bit of a moat remains.

The Synlait land was also carved / and joined with covenants attached. So I'm going to presume there was value / benefit in having those covenants remain.

So what threat did Winstone originally see. They didn't see a threat from the Synlait / Stuart lands - other than the bits with the Covenants.

So the threat must have been from over the road in the Yashili direction - that's what Winstone wanted protection from.

( theres also a bit of a presumption that Winstone bought the Cleaver land off them, then split it and re-megerd it before final sale to Stuart , Stonhill, Ye and Grander - I'm, not 100% sure of this)

Winstone then sold off its remaining land. A good chunk of that land has a quarry pit on it and was zoned for aggregate extraction - so the value of that land would be enhanced because of the moat that had been created by all the various covenants (Bowwater., Synlait and Stuart lands)

Now imagine if the covenants are extinguished. You can immediately see that the green moat will disappear. The protection once offered by that moat has gone.

So, coming back to your argument. Sure Synlait and Stuart can complain about the quarry when Mr Ye goes ahead with it. But Winstones saw this potential and considered it a low level threat. Sure Yashili can complain - but they would have greater grounds for complaint with the moat missing - at the moment they can also take comfort from having a neighbor across the road for 200 years who isn't going to be able to put any negative structure up. Winstone Nutritional can still complain - but their complaint would be greater because they have lost that little smidge of land at the bottom of Synlait which provided a teeny moat.

Can you now see the problem with removing the green moat?


(you have to use your imagination a bit with the plots - a bit of mental juggling wil see the green bits fill the land where the Synlait plant is built)