Federated Farmers Launches ‘SOS: Save Our Sheep' Campaign

Scoop

26-05-2025

Press Release – Federated Farmers
In just one generation New Zealand has lost over two-thirds of our national flock, reducing from over 70 million sheep in 1982 to fewer than 25 million sheep today.
Federated Farmers has launched a new campaign, SOS: Save Our Sheep, calling for urgent action to halt the collapse of New Zealand's sheep industry.
'Once the backbone of New Zealand's economy, sheep are fast becoming an endangered species in this country,' Federated Farmers meat & wool chair Toby Williams says.
'Each year we're losing tens of thousands of hectares of productive farmland. Where sheep and lambs once grazed, pine trees are taking their place.
'Sheep farming is at a real crossroads. That's why farmers are sending out an urgent SOS to save our sheep – and the Government need to answer that call before it's too late.'
In just one generation New Zealand has lost over two-thirds of our national flock, reducing from over 70 million sheep in 1982 to fewer than 25 million sheep today.
Sheep numbers are rapidly plunging with almost a million sheep disappearing every year.
'If that trend continues, we're not going to have any sheep left in our country within two decades. We'll just have hills plastered in nothing but pine trees,' Williams says.
'That would be a huge loss for our country – not just for our economy, but for our cultural identity and rural communities too.'
Williams says the number one driver of sheep farming's collapse is clear: carbon forestry.
'New Zealand's climate change policies are badly broken, and it's gotten to the point where food production and the viability of our rural communities are being threatened.
'The Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) is effectively subsidising pine trees to offset fossil fuel emissions, and that's pushing sheep farmers off the land, never to return.
'We're the only country in the world that allows 100% carbon offsetting through forestry within our ETS.
'Most other countries have recognised this as a significant risk and have quite rightly set policies to restrict it – so New Zealand is way out of step with international norms.'
Between 2017 and 2024, 260,000 hectares of sheep and beef country were swallowed up by pines.
'That's not because forestry is necessarily a better use of the land, but because Government policy makes it more profitable to plant pine trees than to farm sheep,' Williams says.
'Climate policy is trumping food production. We're blindly sacrificing rural jobs, local processing infrastructure, and sustainable red meat exports at the altar of carbon offsetting.
'Unfortunately, the Government aren't doing enough to stop the relentless march of pine trees across productive farmland – and if they don't act soon, it will be too late.'
Federated Farmers is now calling on the Government to urgently review the ETS and fix the rules to either limit or stop the offsetting of fossil fuel emissions with forestry.
Williams says New Zealanders need to ask themselves a simple question: do we still value our sheep industry?
'Because if the answer is yes, we need to act now, and act fast, before it's too late.'