New Zealand Grass-fed Dairy can Support the Soil

In New Zealand, we’re lucky to have fertile soil, abundant water, and our cows are healthy and well cared for. All of these resources are valuable and have their own importance when it comes to dairy farming.

As we know, not all dairy is created equally. Different farming systems exist, ranging from pasture-based systems to housed systems. Despite their differences, all systems have one thing in common - their impact on the planet.

Introduction to soil: A precious resource

To define it in the simplest terms, soil is the loose collection of broken and chemically weathered rock mixed with organic and living matter on the Earth’s surface. It nurtures and sustains our plant life and contains more than a quarter of our world’s biodiversity¹.

Soil contains entire worlds of insects, worms, fungi and micro-organisms, like bacteria and protozoa that all have a role to play in protecting the environment they live in². They help to transform complex chemical forms into simple molecules or compounds that can be absorbed by plants, to nurture productivity and re-growth.

Healthy soil is not only critical to growing high quality pasture, but it also encourages biological activity, has higher cycling of nutrients, resists erosion, holds more water and helps to sequester carbon³.

New Zealands unique soil

Geologically speaking, New Zealand soil is young, having only started its formation since the last Ice Age⁵. Regardless of its age, there are still 15 varieties of soil types (soil orders) found across New Zealand, and within that, 1,914 subdivisions of soil orders (soil series)⁶. Grazed pastures support more organic matter and carbon content in the soil than cultivated fields, as the soil retains a better structure, increasing the amount of water and nutrients it can hold ⁷.

Pasture-based farming can also support healthy underground populations of earthworms and microbes⁷. They can make the soil more efficient at cycling nutrients, ensuring those necessary for life are available through the soil and the pasture. The movement of nutrients from soil into pasture (nutrient cycling) is essential as cows can’t access nutrients like carbon and nitrogen directly.

It’s not only what’s under the ground that counts, but also what happens above it. New Zealand pastures typically have multiple plant species compared to housed systems which often rely on growing single crop species in a monoculture to support feeding cows⁷.  

Some of these species are important in supporting pasture growth, for example, legumes like clover are excellent at capturing atmospheric nitrogen – a nutrient that helps all pasture species grow and provides protein in the cow’s diet. On pastures where there is good clover content, this natural nitrogen capture into the soil can also help reduce the need for synthetic nitrogen fertiliser⁷.

Working with farmers to help improve practices

Our farmer owners are at the heart of our Co-operative, and work alongside their natural ecosystems. They understand the unique characteristics of their land, and we are working alongside them to support their improvements to on-farm practices and farm productivity. 

Together, we approach farming through embracing our country’s fertile land and favourable climate, and connecting that with agricultural practices that help to preserve New Zealand’s ecosystems. 

_{1. Mark A. Anthony, S. Franz Bender , Marcel G. A. van der Heijde (2023). Enumerating soil biodiversity. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2304663120}

_{2. Wang, X., Chi, Y., & Song, S. (2024). Important soil microbiota's effects on plants and soils: a comprehensive 30-year systematic literature review. Frontiers in Microbiology, 15, 1347745. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2024.1347745}

_{3. New Zealand Landcare Research Factsheet: What is soil health? https://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/assets/Discover-Our-Research/Land/Soil-health-resilence/factsheet-soil-health.pdf} 

_{4. FAO, ITPS, GSBI, CBD and EC. 2020. State of knowledge of soil biodiversity - Status, challenges and potentialities, Report (2020). https://www.fao.org/policy-support/tools-and-publications/resources-details/en/c/1363310/}

_{5. https://soils.landcareresearch.co.nz/topics/understanding-soils/nz-soils/}

_{6. https://teara.govt.nz/en/soils/page-3}

_{7. Liz Wedderburn, Stewart Ledgard, Cecile de Klein, Cameron Craigie, Simon Loveday, Karin Schütz, David Pacheco, Warren King, Mike Dodd, Katherine Tozer, David Hume, Alec Mackay, Mitchell Donovan, David Houlbrooke, Andre Mazzetto (2020). Pasture-fed livestock and production and products: cience behind the narrative. https://www.agresearch.co.nz/our-research/pasture-fed-livestock-production-and-products-science-behind-the-narrative/}