June 29, 2025 • 4 mins
The chair of DairyNZ comments on the new season’s breakeven milk price ($8.68), the launch of Resilient Pastures at Fieldays, and 60 years of the Economic Survey.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
It was good to catch up with this lady at
the Primary Industry Summit and awards. The chair of Dairy
and Zed Tracy Brown. She milks six hundred and eighty
cows with the hobby Win and Madamatta near Hobbiton. But
today at Tracy, you are on the show to talk,
amongst other things, about the break even point for dairy farmers.
This is the Dairy and z E contractor, a tracker.
(00:22):
Should I say we need eight dollars sixty eight per
kilogram of milk solars just to break even? That's a
rather high number.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Yeah, it is pie And really what's happened Jamie, as
the cost of input prices has increased at a greater
rate than the rate that the milk price has increased at,
so it has caused some squeeze for farmers. So that's
gone the breaking The milk price has gone up twenty
seven cents on last season's number.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Yeah, I'd haven't bought fertilizer for a number of years,
probably since I was last playing footy for Riversdale. That's
how long ago since I bought fertilizer. But in the
last year, phosphi phosphate prices are up thirty four percent.
Ure are up forty percent. Didn't realize that.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Yep, that's that's been significant. Crude oil prices have recently
surged by seventeen percent with the instability in the Middle East.
Feed prices are up sort of six to thirty seven percent,
with exception of PK, which is sort of down slightly,
but other feed costs are up, you know, energies up.
(01:27):
So yeah, there are some price there are some pressures
there for farmers.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Well, let's hope the payout stays around that ten dollar
mark or even mid to high nines. We would take,
wouldn't we, Tracy.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I think that a number with a ten would be
kod Jamie. I think that would keep most people happy.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Yeah, good on you. Now at Field Days, you guys
launched Resilient Pastures and this is to try and get
our pastures to persist longer. And I put it to
you in the commercial break before we went to air
that you guys in the north have bigger problems than
us guys in the South because you just get more
(02:05):
pets and diseases due to the temperatures.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Yeah, and this has become a bigger show with climate
change show in Northland. We've been farmers up there have
been losing one ton of dry matter a hectare per decade,
and out of the ykatto it's half a ton. But
I think the thing that's important Jdi is Watt's learned
to Northland and the top of the North Island will
provide solutions across the whole country going forward is everywhere
(02:31):
potentially heats up. So the huge investment, big collaboration, seventeen
million dollar project over seven years. We're pretty excited. Seventeen
farmers have expressed an interest in being involved in the
research just since we've announced the launch of the projects,
so that's really really positive.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Well, another exciting news from Dairy and Zed Tracy Brown.
Your economic survey has been going for sixty years. Is
that longer than the beef and lamb and z or
whatever they were back in the day the Meat board.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
Won the meat and all boards economics. I've been going
slightly longer, but we've been going since the nineteen sixties.
Really interestingly, back then, Jamie, the average farm ninety two
cows across fifty nine hectares one point six cows per hectare.
Later on now in this sort of the twenty tens,
(03:24):
we're more like sort of fourteen to four forty cows
on one hundred and forty four hectores two point nine
cows per hectare, So you can sort of see the
productivity gains that have been made over that time, and.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
We're only getting bigger in terms of herd sizes. Has
farm's amalgamate.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I think we're getting more efficient though too, So
that's good news. But I think it's really important to
have this kind of long run data because it helps
us look at how the sector's change. It helps us
support national international reporting on deary. So we're really proud
that we're able to celebrate sixty years off the Economic
Service Now survey.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Yeah, great news. Just to finish on as I said
at the beginning, you're farming there madam Ada and their
hobbiton six hundred and eighty cows. When do you start
carving in the Waikato region middle of July?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
So yeah, it's just around the corner really, Jamie. For us,
things are looking pretty good, and I know a lot
of people cross up and down the country, we including us,
We had real drought conditions in the summer, but our
autumn's being not too bad, so we've recovered pretty well.
So you would have seen too that this season's milk
(04:35):
production was up significantly, up two point nine percent on
last year one point eight eight billion kilograms to one
point nine four billion cag's and milk solids. So yeah,
that was that was good news for dairy as well.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Tracy Brown. Good to catch up with you last week
in christ Church. All the best for carving just around
the corner
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Ye, thanks very much, Shami, have a good day.
It was good to catch up with this lady at
the Primary Industry Summit and awards. The chair of Dairy
and Zed Tracy Brown. She milks six hundred and eighty
cows with the hobby Win and Madamatta near Hobbiton. But
today at Tracy, you are on the show to talk,
amongst other things, about the break even point for dairy farmers.
This is the Dairy and z E contractor, a tracker.
(00:22):
Should I say we need eight dollars sixty eight per
kilogram of milk solars just to break even? That's a
rather high number.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Yeah, it is pie And really what's happened Jamie, as
the cost of input prices has increased at a greater
rate than the rate that the milk price has increased at,
so it has caused some squeeze for farmers. So that's
gone the breaking The milk price has gone up twenty
seven cents on last season's number.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Yeah, I'd haven't bought fertilizer for a number of years,
probably since I was last playing footy for Riversdale. That's
how long ago since I bought fertilizer. But in the
last year, phosphi phosphate prices are up thirty four percent.
Ure are up forty percent. Didn't realize that.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Yep, that's that's been significant. Crude oil prices have recently
surged by seventeen percent with the instability in the Middle East.
Feed prices are up sort of six to thirty seven percent,
with exception of PK, which is sort of down slightly,
but other feed costs are up, you know, energies up.
(01:27):
So yeah, there are some price there are some pressures
there for farmers.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Well, let's hope the payout stays around that ten dollar
mark or even mid to high nines. We would take,
wouldn't we, Tracy.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I think that a number with a ten would be
kod Jamie. I think that would keep most people happy.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Yeah, good on you. Now at Field Days, you guys
launched Resilient Pastures and this is to try and get
our pastures to persist longer. And I put it to
you in the commercial break before we went to air
that you guys in the north have bigger problems than
us guys in the South because you just get more
(02:05):
pets and diseases due to the temperatures.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Yeah, and this has become a bigger show with climate
change show in Northland. We've been farmers up there have
been losing one ton of dry matter a hectare per decade,
and out of the ykatto it's half a ton. But
I think the thing that's important Jdi is Watt's learned
to Northland and the top of the North Island will
provide solutions across the whole country going forward is everywhere
(02:31):
potentially heats up. So the huge investment, big collaboration, seventeen
million dollar project over seven years. We're pretty excited. Seventeen
farmers have expressed an interest in being involved in the
research just since we've announced the launch of the projects,
so that's really really positive.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Well, another exciting news from Dairy and Zed Tracy Brown.
Your economic survey has been going for sixty years. Is
that longer than the beef and lamb and z or
whatever they were back in the day the Meat board.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
Won the meat and all boards economics. I've been going
slightly longer, but we've been going since the nineteen sixties.
Really interestingly, back then, Jamie, the average farm ninety two
cows across fifty nine hectares one point six cows per hectare.
Later on now in this sort of the twenty tens,
(03:24):
we're more like sort of fourteen to four forty cows
on one hundred and forty four hectores two point nine
cows per hectare, So you can sort of see the
productivity gains that have been made over that time, and.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
We're only getting bigger in terms of herd sizes. Has
farm's amalgamate.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I think we're getting more efficient though too, So
that's good news. But I think it's really important to
have this kind of long run data because it helps
us look at how the sector's change. It helps us
support national international reporting on deary. So we're really proud
that we're able to celebrate sixty years off the Economic
Service Now survey.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Yeah, great news. Just to finish on as I said
at the beginning, you're farming there madam Ada and their
hobbiton six hundred and eighty cows. When do you start
carving in the Waikato region middle of July?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
So yeah, it's just around the corner really, Jamie. For us,
things are looking pretty good, and I know a lot
of people cross up and down the country, we including us,
We had real drought conditions in the summer, but our
autumn's being not too bad, so we've recovered pretty well.
So you would have seen too that this season's milk
(04:35):
production was up significantly, up two point nine percent on
last year one point eight eight billion kilograms to one
point nine four billion cag's and milk solids. So yeah,
that was that was good news for dairy as well.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
Tracy Brown. Good to catch up with you last week
in christ Church. All the best for carving just around
the corner
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Ye, thanks very much, Shami, have a good day.
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