With only 35% of the season’s milk collected, enough rain and good pasture growth in summer will be crucial to keep production up.
Fonterra says milk solids volume is 4.7% higher in the first five months of the 2013-14 season than in the last season: 531 million kgMS was collected during the five months, compared to 508m kgMS last season.
The co-op was heading for a record production last season until drought hit parts of the North Island. Last season Fonterra produced 1463m kgMS, 2% lower than the 2011-12 record of 1493million kgMS.
This season, Fonterra says spring conditions – strong winds and heavy rain – challenged farmers. But “despite these challenges daily milk volumes reached a record 87 million litres collected across New Zealand at peak on October 23 and volumes for October were up 3.7% compared to October last year.”
DairyNZ’s regional team manager Craig McBeth says at the end of October about a third of milk for the season had been collected. Milk production in the South Island is up 6% and North Island 4% compared to the same period last year.
McBeth says more dairy conversions and aggressive dairying in Canterbury, South Otago and Southland are lifting milk supply in these regions. In Waikato and Bay of Plenty pasture growth was good and some farmers were still making silage.
“Two weeks ago, there was some good rain in parts of the North Island and this is giving farmers the confidence to continue grazing,” he told Rural News.
But he recommends farmers maintain pasture cover at 1500kgDM/ha so there is good re-growth.
McBeth is urging farmers to keep a close eye on the farm and be prepared for all eventualities.
“Farmers must have prepared to respond if it rains or if it doesn’t rain over the coming months. It’s still early days in the season so weather depending we may have a great year or just a good year.”
