Friday, March 29, 2024

Big boosts for sheep milk sector

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Sheep milk production and processing in the central North Island got two injections of optimism in the past week when value-chain partnerships announced development plans.
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Food Waikato, owned by the Hamilton City Council and Callaghan Innovation, said it intended to build a much bigger sheep milk drier with a mix of public and private debt and equity from existing users.

It will cost $45 million and have 2.4 times the capacity of the existing drier, which processed 900,000 litres over 308 days in the year to June 2017.

The existing drier was built on the Waikato Innovation Park in 2012, subsequently named Food Waikato, as an independent product development spray drier, for dairy and non-dairy.

It was now running at capacity of about 500kg of powder each operating hour, mainly for sheep milk.

Sheep milk was about twice as rich as cow milk, with 18-19% milksolids.

Demand from the sheep milk industry was expected to double by 2019-20, Waikato Innovation Park chief executive Stuart Gordon said.

Among the main users of the existing facility were Spring Sheep Milk, part owned by :Landcorp, and the Chinese-Maori joint venture Maui Milk, part-owned by Waituhi Kuratau Trust.

Maui Milk last week formally opened a new dairy sheep property called Waikino Station on the western shore of Lake Taupo, where initially 2000 ewes will be milked.

They will be on top of the 3000 ewes milked at Kuratau since 2015.

The Chinese partner, Maui Food Group of Shanghai, bought the 770ha Waikino, of which 150ha is now the sheep milking platform, and installed a new GEA 64-bale internal rotary platform imported from France.

Waikino also had two barns capable of housing 2000 ewes for winter shelter or in bad weather and a lamb-rearing facility.

More than 300 farmers and rural professionals attended the opening of Waikino, many keen to evaluate the new rural industry.

Maui Milk general manager Peter Gatley said Waikino was going to drive up milk yield and feed conversion efficiency and showcase a New Zealand style of outdoor sheep management with at least 75% pasture intake.

For these purposes a Southern Cross dairy sheep breed composite was being developed from Coopworth, East Friesian, Lacaune (France) and Awassi (Saudi Arabia).

“NZ needs diversification in agricultural exports and every farmer wants a high value product, stable pricing and environmental sustainability. 

“We admire what the dairy goat industry has achieved but we want to capitalise on NZ expertise in both sheep farming and pastoral systems for milk production,” Gatley said. 

“Like the dairy goat industry we measure total solids including lactose and we aspire to match the dairy goat payout at around $17/kg.”

Gatley said NZ dairy sheep production was 100-150 litres a ewe each season and his goal was the French hybrid grazing level of 400 litres. 

He thought the public-private partnership approach of Food Waikato towards building processing facilities was ideal because it was self-funding and catered for a new industry expanding quickly.

“We have contributed a small amount of capital, along with all other users of the existing drier.”

Spring Sheep Milk was running 2000 ewes on 150ha near Reporoa and was the host of the Primary Growth Partnership programme Sheep – Horizon Three.

Landcorp Farming partnered with SLC Venture LP, headed by Scottie Chapman of Auckland, who said in the past that Spring Sheep was aimed at developing markets for whole milk powder, probiotic powder, calcium tablets, sheep milk tablets and gelato.

Spring Sheep was building a smaller pilot farm near Cambridge and trying to grow the industry to 60 farms by 2030.

It would be promoted as a way for environmentally constrained Waikato dairy cattle farms to convert to a more sustainable footprint.

Both Maui and Spring intend to have suitable dairy sheep genetics for sale after this year’s lambing.

But Waikato has been questioned as a suitable location for dairy sheep because of the animal health challenges.

Lincoln University farm management lecturer Guy Trafford, writing on Interest.co.nz, said other regions could ramp up dairy sheep production easier and faster and were being held back by the lack of a processor.

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