On the 4th day, we spent the afternoon at Lemuel Dairy Goat Farm, where we got to talk to Chris Savage, who has been milking dairy goats for about 19 years now. Now I know very little about dairy (although at this point I was beginning to feel like an expert) and a tiny bit about goats, but I know nothing about dairy goats. This was by far one of my favorite places, just because it was something that I would not even think of, when I thought of New Zealand agriculture.
Now goat milk is kind of a niche market and once again, most of the dairy goat milk produced in New Zealand (95%) is exported to the Asian market, however most of it is turned into high-end infant formula. Goat milk formula has become a niche market in Asia, because it contains a protein profile more similar to human milk, than a cow's.
WE GOT TO MILK THE GOATS!!
Just hanging with some does.
The average dairy goat farm in New Zealand is about 750 goats, and in one milking season each one of those does can make anywhere from $1800-2000, and when Chris told us his kidding rate (a kid is a baby goat) is about 200% per year, I started seriously considering milking dairy goats, myself. There is a lot of stability in the goat milk market, too. In the almost 20 years that Chris has been milking, he's only seen 2 or 3 drops in price which at most were 50 cents per kilogram of milk solids.
These are 4 month old, weaned kids.
Chris will keep about 25% of the doe kids, as replacement does, and sell the rest to other dairy goat farms for replacement does. He'll keep about 5 replacement bucks, and sell the rest who will then fed out and used for meat.
We started to talk to Chris about what our perception about New Zealand agriculture had been before our visit and we had to admit to him that we had not had a clue, which surprised him. New Zealand prides itself on its "clean and green" image, which was obvious because just about every farmer we talked to, made sure to mention it. While no one ever came out and said it, you could tell that their perception of U.S. agriculture was pretty similar to the perception that the typical U.S. consumer has. Factory farms were brought up more than once, which if you know me, you know that factory farm is a dirty word in my book, but I digress until another day.
As always, there's so much more to come. . .
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