John Male
John worked in orchards and market gardens on the west of Auckland where he attained his Master of Science degree.
On graduating in 1974 he joined a forest farming enterprise and designed his first hand move irrigation system for horticulture within the sheltered forest environment. He then joined MWD and was involved in the irrigation scheme developments in Northland before moving to Christchurch and undertaking a review of irrigation research requirements. The outcome of this led to the establishment of an irrigation scheduling business as a founding partner of Hydroservices. Subsequently John worked for international consultancies and his own practice on water resource and irrigation developments before becoming the global irrigation service line leader for GHD where he was part of the successful alliance team that secured the modernisation of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation scheme and investigated the impact of irrigation in the Upper Waitaki.
Now with URS he has jointly developed a tool that allows for farm and scheme estimation of the spatial variation in irrigation demand based on cells representing very small areas to enhance efficient use of water.