Agricultural Transformations – NZ pastoral farming systems past, present and future

Abstract

There are increasing calls for agriculture in NZ to be transformed. The signals from Wellington, especially, suggest that government investors in the primary sector (MPI, MBIE) do not consider that ‘business as usual’ will deliver the improvements in environmentalperformance demanded by the voting public. The Crown Research Institute whose primary focus is pastoral agriculture – AgResearch – has adopted a strapline: ‘Driving prosperity by transforming agriculture? But what does this transformation actually mean?