Through Step Change, DairyNZ, with other sector organisations, will deliver information, resources and support to help you lift profit while contributing to better water quality and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This includes sharing information from projects where farmers have already achieved these gains as well as access to tailored science-based solutions.
Why now?
Dairy farming is constantly evolving. Current drivers for change include:
- a drive to meet sustainability goals and responsible resource management.
- national and regional policy standards – in particular those that cover climate change and fresh water.
- we are world leading farmers in sustainability, and we want to maintain our international position.
- Meeting consumer expectations.
Know your numbers
As a starting point, understanding four key numbers will help provide clarity on where the opportunities might lie in your business and how you compare. Those are:
- Operating profit per hectare
- Debt to asset ratio
- Tonnes of methane emissions per hectare
- Purchased N surplus per hectare.
Next steps
Depending on where the opportunities are in your business there will be a number of areas you might choose to focus on.
- Pasture first is key – growing and harvesting home-grown feed well is the fundamental building block of farm profit. It results in reducing unprofitable feed which increases profit and reduces GHG and N surplus.
- Methane output is highly correlated with feed eaten, and methane is the major part of dairy farming greenhouse gas footprint.
- N leaching is highly correlated with purchased N surplus for an individual farm as it is the amount of nitrous oxide produced (a secondary greenhouse gas).
- Retiring unprofitable or marginal land directly reduces GHG and sequesters carbon.
- Reducing phosphorus, sediment and pathogen loss can be achieved profitably. See Land management.
If you want to know more about how to start or continue the Step Change journey contact us.
Or attend a Know Your Numbers event, in your region. The events are being held from October to December 2020. Find details here.
Lessons in reducing nitrogen losses
Due to targets set by Canterbury Regional Council farmers in Selwyn and Hinds have had to look at ways to reduce nitrogen losses. Since 2018, 50 dairy farms in those catchments have been taking part in a five-year DairyNZ project that is influencing change on hundreds of farms in the region.
Along with the 50 partner farms, 210 dairy operations (out of 460) in both the Selwyn and Hinds catchments have been surveyed, and almost all have adapted their farming practices.
We are using lessons learnt through Selwyn Hinds in the Step Change project.
You can learn more about what they did to reduce N losses here.