Sharemilking feed costs, from one feed record the owner and sharemilker share

On a sharemilked or contract milked farm, two parties share the feed bill. Any split of the feed bill starts with the same question: how many tonnes of each feed came onto the farm? FeedTally answers it from the merchant's own dockets, with the photos to prove it.

Coming soon: docket scanning, the delivery log and the dashboard are still being built. Today you can sign up, set up your farms, feed suppliers and feed types, and invite your team, ready for when FeedTally reads its first docket.

How sharemilking feed costs get split

There is no standard split. DairyNZ's guidance on sharemilking and contract milking arrangements lists feed as something to settle before signing: "How are the feed costs to be split? What type and quantity of feed is expected to be bought in?"

Real agreements use rules like these:

• A sharemilker who pays 26% of any PKE bought, and nothing towards nitrogen. This example comes from John Gardner's paper Sharemilking in New Zealand (IFMA congress, 2011).
• A contract milker who pays nothing for supplements up to a normal-year limit of 120 tonnes, then 25% of anything over it. This was suggested by AgFirst consultant Kim Robinson in Rural News (2019).

The same Rural News article explains why it needs settling early: supplement costs "can cause tension in, say, a bad autumn when the farmer would prefer to dry off but the contractor wants to feed palm kernel to keep milking."

Whatever the rule, both sides need to agree on the tonnes first. A percentage of PKE is only fair if both parties trust the PKE number, including the PKE inside blended loads.

What works today

• Every delivery from every merchant in one log, read from the merchant's docket and checked by the worker
• Tonnes by feed type, shed and merchant, by week, month and year, with blended loads split into each feed
• The docket photo kept with every delivery, so any load can be checked against the paper
• CSV export of the log, to share with the sharemilker or contract milker and work out a split in a spreadsheet today

More on the feed records by shed and supplier.

Sharemilking and contract milking, in short

DairyNZ describes the common arrangements like this:

50/50 sharemilking (herd-owning)

The sharemilker owns the herd, and milk income and costs are split 50/50 between the parties.

Variable order sharemilking

The sharemilker is paid an agreed percentage of the milk income, for example a 55/45 split.

Contract milking

The contract milker is paid a set amount per kg of milksolids, sometimes with a top-up if the milk price goes above an agreed level.

So the main differences are who owns the herd and how the milker is paid: a fixed rate per kgMS, or a share of the milk income. In every case, who pays for bought-in feed is whatever the sharemilking agreement or contract says. Check yours, and get advice on the agreement itself. FeedTally keeps the tonnes, not the legal terms.