Some aspects of the farm income situation in New Zealand

The implementation of effective measures of economic management requires a substantial volume of statistical information as the basis of measurement of the needs and achievements of current policies. Two of the most important economic issues in New Zealand, as in other developed economies, are the growth in the level of incomes and in the level of employment. These issues arise not only in relation to economic policy at a national level but are also of importance down to sectoral and sub sectoral levels where this is of concern to economic policy decision makers. A consideration of the trends and of the prevailing situation of average incomes and of the numbers employed in different sectors of the economy is a major aspect of policies which affect the pattern of income distribution within the community. The economic policies pursued by governments have both a direct and incidental effect on the incomes of the various sectors of society and this is as true in the case of agriculture as for other sectors. The statistical data currently available in New Zealand provide a considerable volume of detail on average net incomes of the major farm types, but no direct information on average incomes of farmers collectively. However, for reasons set out later in this paper, the available statistics on net farm incomes from the various farm surveys are subject to many qualifications such as to make them of limited value. Nor do the data on the numbers employed in farming appear to be sufficiently accurate to make them of real value in any policy assessment