Bledisloe Medal for Mr Hutton

Press, 4 May 1984, Page 8

Bledisloe Medal for Mr Hutton

Mr Athol Hutton, managing director of Waitaki N.Z. Refrigerating, Ltd, has been awarded the Bledisloe Medal for 1984, Lincoln College’s highest award. The award will be presented to Mr Hutton at the college’s graduation ceremony today. The president of the Lincoln College Old Students’ Association, Mr R. J. Diprose, will give the Bledisloe Medal Citation. Mr Hutton has been guiding his company’s move away from the sale of meat in carcase form to that of vacuum-packed cuts ready for the world’s supermarkets and in a form most desired by consumers. Mr Hutton was born in Southland and has the meat industry in his blood, for his father was manager of the Southland Frozen Meat Company’s works at Mataura. He completed a Bachelor of Agricultural Science degree at Lincoln College in 1955 and spent 19 years working for the Hawke’s Bay Farmers’ Co-operative Association, Ltd. He was appointed managing director of Waitaki N.Z.R. in 1981 and is an executive member of the New Zealand Meat Exporters’ Council and board member of Devco and Towers U.K., Ltd. The Bledisloe Medal was initiated in 1930 by Viscount Bledisloe, then GovernorGeneral of New Zealand. Awarded annually, the medal goes to a former student who, through training at the college, has materially assisted farming in New Zealand, or otherwise has advanced the interests of the country. Regulations were extended by Viscount Bledisloe in 1937 for the award to go also to those who had “rendered conspicuous service resulting in material benefit for New Zealand,” even if the work was outside the country.