Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures projects
Find out about Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures (SFF Futures) projects that have been funded so far.
NZ charcuterie culture – fine food manufacturing from grass-fed red meats
- Project start date:
- Project length: 4 years
- MPI funding: $982,320
- Co-investment funding: $1,473,480
- Sectors: Food and beverage products, Meat
- Sub-sectors: Sheepmeat (including lamb)
- Project partners: Four Good Foods
- Regions: Bay of Plenty
Four Good Foods aims to create a new value chain producing fine charcuterie products with new flavours. The meat will be naturally fermented without added nitrates or chemicals. This high-end, unique product has the potential to create a new domestic industry sector and export option for New Zealand red meats.
NZ Does it Better
- Project start date:
- Project length: 2 years
- MPI funding: $500,000
- Co-investment funding: $750,000
- Sectors: Natural fibres
- Sub-sectors: Strong wool
- Project partners: Wild South Manufacturing Limited
- Regions: Canterbury
This project will utilise advanced knitting technology to efficiently manufacture garments using mid-micron strong wool for domestic and international distribution. This new technology isn’t used in New Zealand currently. Manufacturing these garments domestically will create new demand for strong wool and help to lift farm gate pricing. It will also provide skilled employment opportunities for New Zealanders.
NZ Mobile Micro Abattoir Project - Phase 2
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $395,000
- Co-investment funding: $79,000
- Sectors: Māori agribusiness, Meat
- Sub-sectors: Other meat products/research
- Project partners: Aramiro Farm Trust, Waitetuna Ltd
- Regions: Waikato
This project aims to investigate the feasibility of a micro-processing plant that can connect consumers with fresh produce grown right on their own whenua. This project focuses on providing Māori Agribusiness with the option to procure, process and provide environmentally sustainable red meat-based products to its targeted consumer base. Aspects of circular waste management systems, mātauraga Māori and other key values will underpin how the plant will operate.
NZ Pork Carbon Footprint Project
- Project start date:
- Project length: 2 years
- MPI funding: $60,000
- Co-investment funding: $40,000
- Sectors: Meat
- Sub-sectors: Pork
- Project partners: NZ Pork Industry Board
- Regions: Nationwide
This project will enable pig farmers in New Zealand to estimate the carbon dioxide equivalent emissions for pig-meat production and identify ‘hot spots’ for carbon emissions in farming activities. It will also provide collective industry data and comparison with other protein sources.
NZ red meat sector – future proofing against climate change
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $149,500
- Co-investment funding: $102,700
- Sectors: Biosecurity, Meat
- Sub-sectors: Poultry
- Project partners: Meat Industry Association
- Regions: Nationwide
The New Zealand red meat sector is committed to reducing its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2025. To support this goal, this project has calculated the GHG impact of sheep and beef products from farm to consumer using the current internationally recognised, scientifically credible methodology. This has created a benchmark and measures for future emissions reductions, in comparison to other global meat producing countries.
Carbon Footprint of New Zealand Beef and Sheep Exported to Different Markets – Summary report [PDF, 472 KB]
NZ Sheep of the Future
- Project start date:
- Project length: 7 years
- MPI funding: $4,197,800
- Co-investment funding: $6,292,200
- Sectors: Natural fibres
- Sub-sectors: Animal-based fibres
- Project partners: Focus Genetics, Pāmu
- Regions: Nationwide
This programme will focus on new farm system approaches for a range of sheep breeds. The programme will use genetics to help future-proof the industry, breeding sheep with a greater tolerance for hot weather and with lower methane emissions. It will enable benchmarking, breed comparisons, research on new traits, and innovative new breeding programmes focused on optimum meat and wool production.
'Sheep of the Future' transformational for NZ farming
January to March 2024: NZ Sheep of the Future progress report [PDF, 654 KB]
July to September 2023: NZ Sheep of the Future progress report [PDF, 335 KB]
Off-paddock wintering facilities and systems for Southern dairying – Phase 2 & 3
- Project start date:
- Project length: 4 years
- MPI funding: $1,753,590
- Co-investment funding: $1,434,760
- Sectors: Dairy
- Sub-sectors: Other animal dairy products/research
- Project partners: DairyNZ
- Regions: Southland
This initiative will work with two design concepts for uncovered structures where cows are kept during winter, developed during phase one of the project. It will produce detailed designs through extensive consultation with local farmers, and then road-test the concept preferred by farmers and technical experts via an on-farm trial in 2022.
Open Farms
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $50,000
- Co-investment funding: $160,000
- Sectors: Apiculture, Arable, Dairy, Forestry, Horticulture, Meat, Regenerative agriculture
- Project partners: Open Farms Ltd
- Regions: Nationwide
SFF Futures supported a nationwide, cross-sector Open Farm Day experience designed to reconnect urban Kiwis with the people and places that grow our food. Despite COVID-19 disruption in 2021, the project attracted high levels of engagement, positive responses from host farms and visitors, and positive results on building social licence for farming. Eighty-two events were held during the open days in 2020 and 2021, attracting more than 6,000 visitors.
Open Farms 2022-2024
- Project start date:
- Project length: 3 years
- MPI funding: $90,000
- Co-investment funding: $210,000
- Sectors: Apiculture, Arable, Dairy, Forestry, Horticulture, Meat, Regenerative agriculture
- Project partners: Beef + Lamb New Zealand, DairyNZ, Farmlands and Farmers Weekly
- Regions: Nationwide
Open Farms is a nationwide series of on-farm events designed to reconnect urban Kiwis with our land, food and farmers. The platform supports farmers to host engaging, safe events on a single 'national open farm day'. It provides a space for all New Zealanders to participate in our farming story first-hand.
Optimal timing of fertiliser application, seeding and irrigation
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $24,000
- Co-investment funding: $63,568
- Sectors: Agritech, Arable
- Sub-sectors: Other animal dairy products/research
- Project partners: RH Innovation Ltd
- Regions: Nationwide
This project developed a cost-effective soil moisture sensor that is suitable for the horticulture industry. The moisture sensor is capacitive based. This means that it is not influenced by soil salinity and produces clean data. The moisture sensor contains a WiFi modem and sends data to RH Innovation Ltd’s cloud-based AI platform via the internet to remove the guesswork from farmers’ decisions about when to irrigate. One of the main features of the sensor is its ability to capture moisture data at very high frequency. This allows important soil moisture characteristics to be captured that are normally missed by other moisture sensors.
Optimisation of solar power into irrigation and/or stream augmentation systems
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $58,720
- Co-investment funding: $81,221
- Sectors: Agritech, Dairy
- Sub-sectors: Other animal dairy products/research
- Project partners: Eiffelton Community Group Irrigation Scheme Inc
- Regions: Canterbury
This project set out to demonstrate the benefits of a grid-tied solar array system for augmentation of spring-fed streams. Solar arrays are a good source of renewable energy for irrigation and many environmental projects, because of their correlation between solar radiance and evapotranspiration. The research found that installation can provide gross return on capital of 8.7% - 11.7% per annum, with payback periods of 8.5 - 11.6 years.
Eiffelton TSA Business Case Article [PDF, 285 KB]
Eiffelton Performance Report III [PDF, 750 KB]
Optimising Smoltification and King Salmon Rearing in RAS
- Project start date:
- Project length: 3 years
- MPI funding: $251,445
- Co-investment funding: $377,428
- Sectors: Seafood/aquatic
- Sub-sectors: Farmed - marine finfish
- Project partners: New Zealand King Salmon Limited
- Regions: Nelson
This project aims to rear king salmon in a recirculating aquaculture system (RAS). The project will try to optimise the production parameters (lighting, density, flow, feeding) for king salmon production in RAS, and find out how the rearing of fish in these systems impacts smoltification (the process of adapting from freshwater to the ocean).
Orchard digital twin system for orchard optimisation
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $44,680
- Co-investment funding: $188,200
- Sectors: Horticulture
- Sub-sectors: Stone fruit
- Project partners: Fruit Minder Limited
- Regions: Nationwide
This project developed an orchard growing software system focused on cherries with a database built around individual trees, called FruitMinder. FruitMinder gives growers tools to make informed decisions about resource use and requirements, emissions, and yield. It has potential to increase productivity and work well with automated orchard systems.
Organic sector strategy
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $212,500
- Co-investment funding: $163,000
- Sectors: Horticulture, Sector resilience
- Sub-sectors: Apples and pears, Avocados, Berry fruit, Citrus, Floriculture, Kiwifruit, Nuts, Onions, Other fruit/fruit products, Other vegetables/vegetable products, Peas, Potatoes, Squash, Stone fruit, Viticulture
- Project partners: Organics Aotearoa New Zealand
- Regions: Nationwide
Organics Aotearoa New Zealand worked with organic sector stakeholders and others interested in converting to organic to develop a three-year organic sector growth strategy. This will enable the industry to understand and plan for constraints and opportunities around organic consumption, production and processing growth. The strategy identified ways to leverage New Zealand’s organic standard locally and internationally.
Organic Sector Strategy 2022 – Organics Aotearoa New Zealand
Parasitoids for sustainable pest management in eucalypt plantations
- Project start date:
- Project length: 3 years
- MPI funding: $407,011
- Co-investment funding: $492,000
- Sectors: Biosecurity, Forestry
- Sub-sectors: Biosecurity, Conservation forestry
- Project partners: Scion
- Regions: Southland, Waikato
This project will develop sustainable methods to manage eucalyptus tortoise beetle that defoliate Eucalyptus nitens (short fibre producing trees) and limit growth. In particular, it will research the beneficial impact of, and assist with releasing the biological control agent Eadya daenerys, with the aim of establishing it in New Zealand.
Parengarenga BioChar project
- Project start date:
- Completed date:
- MPI funding: $60,688
- Co-investment funding: $63,228
- Sectors: Arable, Māori agribusiness
- Project partners: Parengarenga Inc
- Regions: Northland
BioChar is used overseas as an environmentally friendly soil conditioner. It is a form of organic matter charred under controlled high temperature conditions. The resulting product can be blended with natural organic matter and added to pasture. Parengarenga Incorporation trialled the use of BioChar to identify a product best suited to Far North soil.
Pasture Accelerator
- Project start date:
- Project length: 7 years
- MPI funding: $8,400,000
- Co-investment funding: $12,600,000
- Sectors: Dairy, Meat
- Project partners: Barenbrug, Grasslands Innovation (PGG Wrightson Seeds), Dairy NZ
- Regions: Nationwide
The ‘Pasture Accelerator’ programme focuses on genomic technology that combines genetic information and physical information to speed up the traditional ryegrass and clover breeding processes. Ryegrass will be bred to handle heat better and use nitrogen more efficiently, and there will be a focus on breeding higher yielding and more resilient clovers. This research will underpin greater returns for pastoral farmers with the improved yields estimated to increase revenue to farmers by around $1 billion by 2040.
Government backs climate-resilient pasture programme – Government media release
Pasture Accelerator outcome logic model [PDF, 212 KB]
October 2023 to December 2023 – Pasture Accelerator progress report [PDF, 272 KB]
July 2023 to September 2023 – Pasture Accelerator progress report [PDF, 271 KB]
Paths to farm ownership
- Project start date:
- Project length: 1 year
- MPI funding: $37,500
- Co-investment funding: $37,500
- Sectors: Dairy, Sector resilience
- Sub-sectors: Other animal dairy products/research
- Project partners: SMASH Trust, DairyNZ
- Regions: Nationwide
This project aims to support young farmers into farm ownership to help facilitate the retention of workers in the dairy sector. It will develop video case studies and information for field days, drawing from interviews with successful dairy farm operators to demonstrate successful pathways into farm ownership.
Pathways to primary sector leadership: Māori women & young women
- Project start date:
- Project length: 3 years
- MPI funding: $566,650
- Co-investment funding: $228,000
- Sectors: Sector resilience
- Project partners: Agri-Women’s Development Charitable Trust (AWDT), Agricultural and Marketing Research and Development Trust (AGMARDT)
- Regions: Nationwide
This project will deliver two leadership development programmes, Māori Women’s Leadership - Wāhine o te Whenua and 'Generation Change' for young women in tertiary study or training – Pathways to Primary Sector Careers. The programmes will empower Māori women and young women to accelerate progress and change in New Zealand’s primary sector and rural communities.
Pāua biomass restoration
- Project start date:
- Project length: 3 years
- MPI funding: $50,000
- Co-investment funding: $47,000
- Sectors: Seafood/aquatic
- Sub-sectors: Other fisheries research - data
- Project partners: PauaMAC 7 Industry Association Incorporated
- Regions: Marlborough, Tasman, West Coast
This project aims to investigate the factors limiting pāua recruitment and fishery productivity in the PAU7 fishery, at the top of the South Island. It will involve dive work and environmental monitoring of the PAU7 aquatic environment. This will underpin a recovery strategy for the fishery.