History of Butter in New Zealand
1800s
In the year 1814, Samuel Marsen brought a bull and two heifers to New Zealand. (University of Waikato, 2006). The cows were hand milked in sheds. This was often a family task with the wife and children milking the cows twice a day, morning and night. Hand milking involved such a significant labour input that a critical condition of expanding a dairy herd was a comparable increase in family labour (Warr, 1988). The milk was then churned by hand. Dairying was not primarily undertaken as a commercial enterprise, settlers often ran one or two cows to meet family requirements (Warr, 1988).
Up until 1882 exporting butter was based on trial and error. They tried to ship it to Britain and Australia, however, when it got there the butter was rancid so they were unable to sell it.
In the 1880s refrigeration was introduced and the first successful shipment of dairy products took place thus opening up a lucrative trade between New Zealand and the United Kingdom. In 1884 the first dairy factory equipped exclusively for butter making established near Palmerston North (Warr, 1988).
1900s
Early 1900s: the first milking machine was in use (University of Waikato, 2006). This allowed greater production thus increasing the amount we could export. Date markings by cypher was in use in 1908 allowing supervisors to know when the product was made and the best before date (Warr, 1988). Also in the early 1900s the transport transitioned from horses and carts to motorised transport.
Over the next two decades 7,600 milking machines were installed and operating. The turnover from milking by hand to machine milking happened by the year 1920 (University of Waikato, 2006).
The population of cows in New Zealand in 50 years almost doubled! From 1.7 million cows in 1949 to 2.7 million in 1994. The value of the butter export significantly increased.
Currently
The majority of butter produced in New Zealand is exported which makes up 40% of the market of butter traded internationally (IUF, 2011).
Looking back at the changes made throughout history, we can see why the process is the way it is currently. This is because it can acommodate for the increased demand by more effecient processes such as dairying farms and meanwhile decreasing costs,
