What is Rise & Shine?
Rise and Shine is a campaign to tell the story of why New Zealand dairy farmers are the world’s most sustainable dairy farmers, funded by DairyNZ.
New Zealand dairy farmers have great story to tell and want to see it told. This is to help grow understanding of how we farm in New Zealand, and why we should feel proud of our farmers and our dairy products.
Farming has a range of challenges and opportunities. Our world is changing, and New Zealand dairy is responding. The Rise and Shine campaign aims to share the story of our world-leading farmers as they continue to rise to challenges and raise the bar on-farm to maintain our position as the world’s most sustainable dairy farmers. That is when our farmers shine.
What’s special about New Zealand dairy?
Our footprint
- New Zealand milk is produced with world-leading carbon efficiency
- New Zealand milk has a lower carbon footprint than alternative milks and beverages when compared on a nutrient density basis (most comparisons are made on a volume basis).
Our contribution to the economy
- Dairy is NZ’s biggest exporter earner – worth around $20b per year and accounts for one in every three dollars earned by New Zealand for exporting goods
- The New Zealand dairy sector provides direct employment for around 50,000 people
- Dairy is the most internationally connected industry in the NZ economy, with almost 90% of its output by value exported, the remaining 10% being domestically consumed
- Dairy has a big contribution to regional economies being a top 10 purchaser of output from a third of all other industries in New Zealand.
Our healthy farming environment is great for cows
- New Zealand’s pastoral farming system provides a different environment to how many animals are raised internationally – it allows animals to enjoy fresh air, space and sunshine
- Our antibiotic use is very low by world standards
- New Zealand is Foot and Mouth Disease free and has the most favourable bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) status possible
- No use of growth promotants
- A love for animals is what drives many New Zealand dairy farmers to keep farming. A recent survey of dairy farmers found that over 40% said that working and caring for their animals was their biggest motivator to get out of bed in the morning.
Our milk is highly nutritious
- New Zealand dairy products feed over 100m people globally
- Milk and other dairy foods are highly nutritious. It is a great source of protein, calcium and are loaded with essential vitamins and minerals, including carbohydrates, protein, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, vitamins A, D, B12, riboflavin and niacin.
Our farmers
- New Zealand dairying is unique because of the special people who are New Zealand dairy farmers.
See our plan for the future
