Thomas MacDonald, a third-generation dairy farmer from the Waikato, has found a unique space within the New Zealand Agricultural sector, combining the strengths of producing high quality dairy products with our national expertise of farming sheep. From this approach, Spring Sheep Company was born; a sheep milk nutrition company providing the goodness of sheep milk, in the form of infant formula, to the world. Thomas has been the Chief Operating Officer of Spring Sheep since 2015 when the company was created, with his role allowing him to get exposure to business operations, as well as farm systems and genetics, right through to the supply chain. A key part of his role has been to figure out how to approach sheep milking in a New Zealand context.
“…when we set Spring Sheep up, back then sheep milk was a bit of a novel concept for New Zealand, that there be a market opportunity for it, that grows an alternative protein in particular infant formula was going to be something that it’s gonna be a good fit for New Zealand really. And we came back and said New Zealand’s really good farming sheep, we’re really good at exporting dairy products, why have we not put these together? And part of my role then part of the journey that Spring Sheep’s been on has been figuring out how we do that in New Zealand, which has been good lot of fun really and it’s taken about 8 years and we’ve grown the business today to farm close to 20,000 milking sheep and turning that into primarily infant formula for export out of NZ, around the world.”
Spring Sheep currently has two geographic regions and two milk pools that supply the company in Waikato and Taranaki. One of the key drivers for this was proximity to the manufacturing plant, but in a broader sense, Thomas identified that dairy farming in New Zealand has prominent roots in these regions. This has allowed access to land that is good for dairy, dairy IP, skillset, and knowledge from a farmer level, as well as the ability to grow great grass. Additionally, they have looked to find areas where smaller farms are that may have issues regarding economic viability, succession, and sustainability, so Waikato and Taranaki have been a natural fit for Spring Sheep operations.
What sustainability means to Thomas
For Thomas, sustainability is something he thinks about on two levels, with regards to custodianship and repeatability.
“I guess the first one is around custodianship, around care and nurture for what we’re doing, but probably lately we’ve been thinking about the repeatability of things and the sustainability or the ability to pass it through generations and I think about that in a personal context in our own little family business, but I also think of that from a Spring Sheep context. We had the opportunity to set Spring Sheep up as effectively a new industry for New Zealand. There wasn’t a demonstrator who had the behavioural way of doing things there was globally. So, it was really important around that repeatability, and I guess the underlying driver for what we did in the sustainability space was, is this something that we can genuinely set up and say we initiated, and we set the ball rolling on these practices and we’re proud of them from a custodianship perspective, but also our repeatability perspective. So, I guess that’s a bit of an insight to the two ways we’ve been thinking about. But, I think primarily the burden that we carried when you’re thinking about a farm system design, setting up and pioneering a new farming system was that there wasn’t going to be the ability to blame the previous generations, perhaps with some of the practices that were seen in the industry and so that is a great burden, but also an incredible privilege and a big responsibility going forward and something we’ve tried to carry into the design of the Spring Sheep farming system”
The Zealandia® Sheep breed – targeting production and sustainability
A key part of the Spring Sheep journey has been breeding a sheep that is best suited to the purpose of sheep milking in the New Zealand pasture-based context. Through the development of a breeding programme, Spring Sheep launched their own sheep breed, Zealandia®, which is registered with the NZ Sheep Breeders Association, and is used exclusively by all Spring Sheep farmers. Not only has this allowed them to breed fit-for-purpose animals, but it has also allowed them to control different sustainability and productivity measures, such as methane emissions.
“One of the pillars that comes with the Zealandia® breed is the fact that we’ve been pretty early on in the adoption of the methane breeding value in our overall breeding index. That’s some wonderful work being done by our New Zealand scientists down in Dunedin, Invermay, through AgResearch. For me, that’s a no brainer when you look at some of the science there, particularly around methane reduction ability over time, and for Spring Sheep and our context, we’ve been part of the breeding value creation initiative for the last three or four years and now being able to get the trending of that data and obviously push it into breeding index and make breeding decisions based on the relative methane output of our ram which in turn obviously flows through the sheep flock. And so that’s just one example where it doesn’t necessarily cost you a lot of money. It certainly doesn’t take you a whole lot of time. It’s a couple of days’ worth of rams going through trailers to get the methane measured on them and then it certainly isn’t costing us a significant portion in trade-off for some of those economic traits around milk production and so by definition it becomes relatively low hanging fruit on a journey to breeding low methane emitting animals, lining up with some of the country’s obligations around Net Zero. So that’s probably the key one that I’m excited about.”
A key focus of the breeding programme for Zealandia® sheep breed has been to be guided by genomics. Thomas identified that this has allowed less reliance on thinking about individual sheep breed types, and instead has allowed for greater focus on building the ideal genetic mix for the conditions here in New Zealand. While it is easy to get caught up in breed types or origin of breed types, the genomic focus allows Spring Sheep to be in purpose-led pursuit of building a sustainable, enduring, and resilient sheep for New Zealand pasture-fed sheep milk.
Facing change and regulation
There is a lot of overwhelm, burnout and apathy in the industry currently in relation to never-ending, and fast-paced change, however, Spring Sheep Co. has been sitting in an area that is all about change and evolution. Establishing the sheep milking industry in New Zealand is a huge change in itself, therefore Thomas and Spring Sheep have faced constant evolution and change of farming models, feeding regimes, genetics, design of infrastructure, and breeding objectives.
There are two key concepts that help Thomas and Spring Sheep face the change and evolution in front of them:
Strong ideas held lightly
“We’re never too afraid in the Spring Sheep business context to be sort of rock solid and committed to ideas, but then be open to change as that data and that observation comes through.”
Guided by values – always having the end consumer in mind
“…the specific ones that come to mind on this topic ‘Give and get respect’ with each other around different viewpoints and different values that are coming across. We like to be passionate superstars and so we carry a lot of energy and passion in what we do and then integrity in everything, and so that’s a non-comprehensive list but just covering some of the mindset that we bring when we approach change and regulation. I think more from I guess an environmental sustainable perspective we think specifically about regulation and impacting our farm system, we have the benefit at Spring Sheep to be connected in a vertically integrated supply chain, so we get to talk to customers on a daily basis almost and it’s a privilege in the fact that we get real time feedback from what the market is demanding, what the market is wanting. And I guess it’s a fair comment to say that often regulation is just responding or catching up to that, and in our business, a lot of the constraints we’ve put on system design, be it feeding regimes or compliance and monitoring has actually been more driven by customer focus than it has been by meeting regulation. And that’s an interesting thing to grapple with in itself around how you extract value and partner with customers. But I think that mindset of always having the end consumer in mind, always understanding where your products going and how you’re going to monetize that and continue to build a sustainable farm system has led some of our approach and thinking to dealing with sustainability issues as they come from a regulatory perspective.”
Thomas’s take home sustainability tip for other farming businesses
Thomas is a strategic thinker and enjoys thinking or planning in a 5-to-10-year context, which he sees as allowing him to keep the context of where the business is heading front of mind in decision making.
“I do like thinking about things and problems and opportunities over that longer term 5-to-10-year horizon. And that’s for our business, what we’ve done with Spring Sheep around thinking about our sustainability and our growth journey as well, I think for any farming business sustainability can mean different things to a multitude of different farming businesses, but it always has to make sense in the context of where you’d like to take your business. It could be from a succession perspective. It could be from a growth and scale perspective. I think it ultimately needs to have that sustainability lens on it, be that true environmental sustainability, it might be the custodianship, but it could also be the repeatability aspect – is what you’re doing repeatable and what did it look like in five years’ time? To your comment earlier, who is the ultimate customer of our farming business? And I like to think about those things on a 5-plus year basis to help them inform what you do in their immediate week ahead.”
Thomas’s Farming Business and the Sustainable Development Goals
When looking at how the SDGs are integrated through Thomas and Spring Sheep Company from the full podcast conversation, there are a clear top five:
Goal # 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
- This conversation with Thomas from Spring Sheep hit the triple whammy here. They are innovative in their approach, and they have leveraged off existing infrastructure systems within the traditional New Zealand dairy sector.
Goal #13: Climate Action
- This is clear with their proactive focus on climate action with their involvement in the low methane sheep breeding value programme.
Goal # 17: Partnerships for the Goals
- With their close connection to the end consumer and real time feedback that allows them to adapt quickly to the signals they’re receiving from market, it shows a real desire and attitude to be on the journey with all parts of the vertical supply chain, generating best outcomes at all levels.
Goal #11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
- This example isn’t necessarily about a community in a geographical sense but as a vertically integrated supply chain, Spring Sheep has built a farmer collective which allows them to have a community of farmers that are supported with resources and security within the business.
Goal #3: Good Health and Wellbeing
- Thomas raised two key points regarding mindset in the face of change, which is something that is so important. Firstly, the notion of ‘strong ideas held lightly’ – how to be passionate superstars with rock solid conviction but be open minded to adapt based on data or observation.
- Secondly, the practice of choosing to take an alternative perspective on an issue – this allows you to appreciate a different point of view and may either soften your standpoint or allow you to compromise on an issue.