Conversion of family farms and resilience in Southland, New Zealand

Forney, Jérémie; Stock, Paul V. (2014). Conversion of family farms and resilience in Southland, New Zealand International journal of sociology of agriculture and food, 21(1), pp. 7-29. The Research Committee on Food and Agriculture

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The well-known deregulation of New Zealand agriculture prompted the growth of dairy farming, particularly in the region of Southland. The formation of the giant cooperative Fonterra only exacerbated the conversion of sheep farms into dairy farms that challenged both farmers’ and the region’s traditional identity as a sheep country. Interviews with converted farmers show that farming families convert to dairy primarily in an attempt to preserve what is important for them: farm succession and a professional identity. At the community level, conversions to dairy prompted economic revival and a reversal of population loss. This article engages the literature on resilience and rural communities to explore Southland’s adaptation to new economic and farming realities while exploring potential shocks in the future around financialization and environmental well-being.

Item Type:	Journal Article (Original Article)
Division/Institute:	School of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences HAFL > Resource-efficient agricultural production systems School of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences HAFL > Agriculture
Name:	Forney, Jérémie and Stock, Paul V.
Subjects:	S Agriculture > SB Plant culture S Agriculture > SF Animal culture
ISSN:	0798-1759
Publisher:	The Research Committee on Food and Agriculture
Language:	English
Submitter:	Service Account
Date Deposited:	29 Jan 2020 13:15
Last Modified:	29 Jan 2020 13:15
ARBOR DOI:	10.24451/arbor.5810
URI:	https://arbor.bfh.ch/id/eprint/5810