1 Background
The 2022-23 DairyNZ Economic Survey summarises a sample of dairy farm data from the DairyBase® database. DairyBase® is available to all levy paying New Zealand dairy farmers. Annual surveys before 2005-06 were conducted by the Livestock Improvement Corporation (LIC) and Dexcel using a random sampling procedure stratified by region and herd size. In contrast, participation in DairyBase® is voluntary, and on average, it includes farms that have higher-than-average milk production levels. For this publication, groups of farms were selected to match the average regional herd size, hectares and milksolids production as published in the New Zealand Dairy Statistics 2022-23 as close as possible while maintaining a large sample size.
The purpose of DairyBase® is to improve the financial understanding and performance of dairy farmers using a benchmarking approach and is designed to link the physical and financial performance of farms. DairyBase® contains financial data from annual farm accounts, physical data supplied by the farmer, and estimated current market values of fixed assets. The DairyBase® support centre, accredited accountants and other rural professionals enter the data on behalf of their clients, and it is validated within DairyBase®. Farmers wishing to benchmark their farm performance have access to a wide range of statistics in DairyBase®, including (where numbers permit) regional, district and production system data.