Following the herd. Image: Su Leslie 2018
New Zealand’s wealth has long depended on exploiting natural resources; native forests, marine life (including seals and whales), and — once the trees had been felled — grazing animals on the vast tracts of land left behind.
In the early 1980s, there were 22 sheep for every human living in this country. Then dairy (and to a lesser extent beef) farming became more profitable, and now, while there are still six sheep for every person in NZ, humans are outnumbered about 2:1 by cows, around 65 percent of which are dairy cows.
Farmer moving herd of cows, Tuapeka, Otago, NZ. Image: Su Leslie 2018
Dairy farming in particular is hugely damaging to the natural environment; half of NZ’s greenhouse gas emissions come from this activity, and you can add massive damage to soil and waterways and the impacts of transporting millions of tonnes of milk around the country, etc.
Yet even as the IPCC report is painting a picture of a world in absolute climate crisis, the industry continues to grow, with bigger farms and more land being converted to pasture.
Cows are herding animals, but it seems to me that many humans are too. And once the “dairy is good” herd gained momentum, it is proving incredibly difficult to turn them back.
Turning away from the herd. Image: Su Leslie 2018
Posted to the Ragtag Daily Prompt | herd
Zimmerbitch 
As long as we live in a profit-oriented world there will be little change in our herding drive. Your post is a call for change, Su!
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I agree Peter. I saw a headline this morning that basically said the biggest contributors to climate change are the world’s billionaires. It was so depressing, I couldn’t bear to read on.
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I believe most of your dairy is for export, as with your lamb. It is easier to find NZ lamb than local lamb in our grocery stores here in Canada.
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Absolutely. Even with Kiwis appetite for meat and cheese, we’d never get through all we produce. And as long as the world will keep buying it, our farmers will keep destroying the land to produce. ☹️
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And consider the consumption of fossil fuels necessary to market meat far from your shores.
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Absolutely. The same is true for dairy. The “food miles”are horrendous.
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I find that is true. Canadian lamb is extremely difficult to find in Canada.
Leslie
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We got better quality NZ lamb in the UK than here 🙁
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We can find the Canadian lamb and it is really good. You have to wonder why they do all this trade all around the world?
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The myth that growth is good!
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Each country should be as self-sufficient as possible and trade should be for things that not readily available in certain parts of the world. Just think of all the tanker fuel we would save.
Leslie
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Yes!
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🙂
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We have also had more lamb dinners in the UK and Europe than in recent times when back in NZ. Cost is usually the reason for not buying and eating less meat!
Thoughtful post, Su!
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Thank you Suzanne. My son has become more or less a vegetarian this year for exactly that reason. He is a student and the budget doesn’t stretch to meat. He is a good cook though, and learned to make some vegetarian food from me, so I know he and his girlfriend do eat quite well on their limited means.
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Eating well on a budget is a challenge and having cooking skills makes it so much easier. Learning to cook a meal should be something every young person needs to acquire before leaving home. I still remember my floating years with males that had no kitchen skills 🙄
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I experienced those years too; and made it my mission to ensure that my boy grew up knowing that food is something that comes from a home kitchen, not a takeaway joint. We always cooked together when he was little, and as a teenager we asked that he produce one family meal per week. I’m so glad I did that. He is not only a good cook, but he appreciates the effort involved and isn’t a fussy eater.
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We had no children though I have cooked/baked with my nieces.
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😀
Teaching children to cook is one of the best and most fun things I have ever done.
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Totally agree Su!
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Flatting not floating though at times lol
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It is all very alarming. The IPCC report doesn’t fill one with much confidence if the action needs to be taken now to avert the “baked in” effects. Great captures – very moody with that low mist / cloud and capturing the patches of light.
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Thanks. I agree. I look around me and am struggling to find anyone who even seems to be aware of how close we are. It’s all takeaway coffee, super-sized burgers, having the latest phone and planning the next trip to Fiji ☹️
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I see the real problem as being too many people in the world. It seems to me that every one of the world’s issues comes back to this ultimately, and many of us in the developed world are huge consumers of just about everything. Not everyone though. I went to two vegan restaurants in Sydney recently, and they were both packed with people enjoying vegan food. So popular. And the food was very tasty, especially the vegan pizzas- in restaurant run by Italians! I didn’t miss meat or cheese at all.
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Consumerism has become such a fixed mindset. So many people define themselves in terms of their ability to consume — rather than by what they produce. It’s terrifying and also very sad. We know that creativity and making things brings satisfaction, while buying stuff tends to make people less satisfied.
I totally get that people are beginning to enjoy vegan food more. There are some wonderful recipes around, and some great cooks producing really delicious vegan food. And it can be much cheaper — very important when so many people are struggling financially.
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Reblogged this on Wobbly Warrior's Blog.
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The worst part is that good cropping land that was totally unsuitable for dairy was grabbed up during the milk price boom, and this is where a lot of the problem came in. Plus there is not enough enforcement of pollution bylaws. It’s worth pointing out though that New Zealand still has less pollution than many of the industrial countries – not an excuse to carry on as we are – but should be kept in mind. The urgency has not sunk in with politicians and profiteers…
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I agree totally Maureen. It would be great to think that we never become as polluted as some other countries — but as long as there is profit to be made …
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sadly, yes
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indeed, but surely now everybody must start to realize….
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I wish! And of course there is a difference between awareness and willingness to make any actual personal sacrifices.
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True. True. And worrying. The rest of us look to New Zealand as a leader in things environmental. Good for you for raising the issue. (And GREAT photos, too!!)
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Oh Janet, if only NZ lived up to it’s “clean, green” image. It is rather a case of our PR being great, and our behaviour not so much.
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Say it ain’t so!!! Who else do we have?
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Iceland and some of the Scandanavian countries — although NZ did rank 11th on the 2016 Environmental Performance Index (EPI) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/maps-and-graphics/most-and-least-environmentally-friendly-countries/
Sadly, I think we’ve probably declined since then.
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Wow, that is a startling figure, Su. Over half of all of NZ’s greenhouse gas emissions come from dairy production? I confess I eat way too much cheese. It seems to be the only thing that doesn’t play havoc with my blood glucose levels. Remind me again, does NZ have carbon-pricing? I wonder whether that would influence what animals farmers chose for dairy production? Sheep and goats don’t produce quite as much methane is my understanding, but any large scale commoditised food production seems to bring with it massive environmental costs. There is a huge amount of plant waste generated as well.
When Australia had carbon pricing, our emissions did begin to decrease. Unfortunately, there were far too many exemptions, such as agriculture and trade-exposed industries. And we can’t get away from the hoary chestnut of over-population.
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I eat a lot of cheese too — and despite my best intentions, not usually from artisan eco producers 😦
We do have a carbon trading scheme but — surprise, surprise — it doesn’t include agriculture.
Dairy is NZ’s largest export sector, and has a kind of cultural sacredness that makes it difficult for rational arguments to gain traction. 😦
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Same here, Su. But many here are getting out of milk production. We can’t compete with the New Zealanders. 🙂
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😦 and as long as our government allows “free” use of water for irrigation, we will produce artificially cheap food.
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It is indeed dispiriting the way the global economy is raping the earth for the gain of the few. We need all the Cayman Islands loot repatriated and put to use mending what has been destroyed.
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Forgot to say – very effective moody cow pix.
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Thanks Tish. We were stuck in the car behind the herd for several miles, so I had lots of opportunities to photograph cows’ bums.
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You made good use of your time!
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I actually read a headline yesterday that said the biggest contributors to climate change is the world’s billionaires!
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I can believe it too. Nicholas Shaxton’s book (available as a free pdf I think) Treasure Islands delineates how, since the collapse of Empire all the world’s wealth is deliberately being siphoned into the Cayman Islands, and in the hands of the few, and with official-unofficial sanction. The whole system supports world environmental rapine. The tax justice network is campaigning on the issue: https://www.taxjustice.net/ This is of course why the Brexiteer financiers want out of the EU – it’s aiming to regulate the billionaires.
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How unbelievably depressing ☹️
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Hm. It is.
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Now I feel very badly for my addiction to cheese. Everything is better with cheese.
However it was interesting to read this post when just yesterday I was reading about a local provincial park called Sandbanks. It’s famous for its massive sand dunes … which I learned were caused by grazing cows in the early 1900s that stripped away the grasses which kept the sand stable. It took about 30 years before the federal government recognized the damage that was occurring and attempted to halt the growing sand dunes by planting trees, but the damage Is now irreversible – and the sand dunes keep growing.
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Perhaps we need a cheese-eaters offset scheme like they have with airfares where you can add a donation to plant a tree to offset the emissions from your flight — or in this case, grilled cheese sandwich. I can happily live without meat, but cheese (and milk in my coffee) are food pleasures I would miss terribly in a vegan world.
We have similar problems on our west coast with the growth of sand dunes — and similarly ineffective responses. 😦
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So very true and worrying, Su. As long as we buy your stuff, NZ farmers at going to produce. If your apples etc weren’t so much cheaper than our local stuff, people surely wouldn’t buy them. The gloomy cow shots are a perfectly fit for this post.
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It is hard to believe that apples can be transported half way around the world and be cheaper than local produce. But of course that is true of so many things, and will be so as long as society provides the infrastructure that makes trade possible but doesn’t tax businesses properly for their share of that.
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Exactly. 😦
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I’m a vegetarian who knows she should be a vegan. That makes me part of the problem, I know. Maybe a New Year resolution coming on? But I do love cheese 😟
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Sigh; me too. But i do wonder how much impact just eating less would have. Cheese isn’t a new food, but industrial production of it is, and that means it appears in all sorts of dishes where it really isn’t necessary because we’ve got used to it and it’s relatively — and artificially — cheap. 😀
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I live next to a beef farm and opposite a dairy farm, so lots of herding going on around me. We gave up red meat this year (have chicken once a month) but I struggled to give up dairy, especially cheese and butter, though the OH has swapped to alternative milk and yoghurt. I also try to buy what is in season locally instead of imported fruit and vegetables, but it is crazy. Picked up tomatoes the other day – some were from Spain whereas others (same variety, same price) were from the UK. Considering how much food is thrown away from supermarkets it would be better surely to import less and sell out. At the moment I just feel that our planet is doomed. 😦
PS I do like your cow photos
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Cheese certainly seems to be a weakness of lots of us here. I like coconut yogurt, and use coconut milk/cream in desserts, but I really prefer cow’s milk in my coffee. I do buy organic milk from a small(ish) I dependent supplier, but I still have the niggle about dairying generally.
I agree with you about food waste and over-ordering. And sadly, I am also feeling equally gloomy about the future of the planet (or at least our tenure here).
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Gloomy times. And how we extract ourselves from the phosphate plundering which supports NZ farming I have no idea.
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Yes; the problems all seem so big, and so interwoven with greed and privilege.
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