Situation and outlook for New Zealand agriculture and forestry (August 2007)
1 Why we forecast
Within the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF), MAF Policy has the primary role of advising the Government on what will encourage a prosperous, innovative, and sustainable primary sector. Our advice is impartial and rigorous and represents what will be best for New Zealand as a whole.
Situation and Outlook for New Zealand Agriculture and Forestry (SONZAF) provides a detailed picture of our understanding of what is happening in the agriculture and forestry sectors. We examine some of the fundamental issues the sectors are facing, and predict the likely economic and market conditions that New Zealand will face from 2007 to 2011.
This understanding underpins our policy advice to the Government.
The information in this publication allows both industry and the public to have an informed debate about the future of New Zealand’s primary sector. Informed debate leads to better advice to the Government and better outcomes for the sector and New Zealand as a whole.
Reading this publication will help you to understand where New Zealand’s primary sector is heading and why it is moving in that direction. The issues chapters (chapters 3 to 6) examine key concepts that will underpin our success in the future, and the forecasting chapters (chapters 7 to 16) provide detailed pictures of what is likely to happen in particular industries.
Forecasting involves projecting the present situation and trends into the future. In other words, we use the information we have to predict what is likely to happen in the future. Forecasting is widely used in government in New Zealand and throughout the world as a way of understanding what the future might look like and enabling us to prepare wisely for it.
MAF understands what drives and affects the agricultural and forestry sectors. These drivers are things such as international demand and supply, weather conditions, non-economic incentives, and patterns of rural life. Although we use economic trends to predict supply and demand in the future, we understand the agricultural and forestry sectors are also affected by key non-economic drivers, such as the weather and other environmental influences. We also consider the effects of animal disease and international agricultural policies in important economies such as the European Union and United States.
Using our understanding of all of these influences, we forecast, or predict, what the sector is likely to look like in the future. These economic forecasts provide a context and framework within which we can develop sound policy. The forecast period referred to in this report is from 2007 to 2011.
Contact for Enquiries
Manager
Monitoring and Evaluation
MAF Policy
PO Box 2526
Wellington
NEW ZEALAND
Phone: +64 4 894 0623
Fax: +64 4 894 0741
Contact this person
