With the launch of the MPI Grass-Fed Administrative Standards in June 2025 OverseerFM has moved on from the the old draft AsureQuality Grass-Fed Standard and now uses the terms of the MPI dairy and red meat standards to report on grass-fed status. MPI has now published legally recognised administrative standards to give exporters and local brands a single, defensible definition of “grass-fed”, and OverseerFM can help them understand if their suppliers are meeting the definition.
The dairy grass-fed standard criteria
- New Zealand Grass-Fed for dairy means that types of grass must make up, on average, at least 90% of the diets of dairy animals supplying the milk pool. The animals must also have access to pasture for at least 340 days of the year, for at least 8 hours per day. (A milk pool is the total volume of milk collected from a group of dairy farms, in this case, the farms operating under a particular scheme).
- New Zealand Grass-Fed for an individual dairy farmer means at least 90% of the animal’s diet is grass-fed feed types, and they can graze outside at least 340 days a year.
The meat grass-fed standard criteria
- For meat-producing animals, they must be fed mostly types of grass, and graze outside year-round.
What the new MPI standards actually cover (high-level view)
| Area | Dairy Standard | Meat Standard | What it means day-to-day |
|---|---|---|---|
| Diet |
Herd diet must average ≥ 90 % grass or forage (fresh-weight). |
Diet must be “predominantly grass” (the standard doesn’t set a single percentage but the intent mirrors the dairy rule). |
Up to 10 % supplementary feed is still fine – but OverseerFM will now count anything outside Schedule 2 as “non-grass” automatically. |
| Pasture access |
Cows must be free to roam for ≥ 340 days / year AND ≥ 8 h/day. |
Red-meat species must be outdoors all year except for legitimate welfare events. |
OverseerFM tracks hours off-paddock just as before; some labelling has been updated to better reflect "Grazing Days" + Time Outdoors |
| Scope & parties |
Covers farm dairy operators, processors, scheme owners, conformity-assessment bodies and MPI’s own listing process. |
Same architecture for meat. |
The software does not certify you – it just tells you if your numbers line up so you’re audit-ready. |
| Feed definitions |
Schedule 2 lists every grass-fed and non-grass-fed feed type. |
Schedule 1 equivalent for meat. |
OverseerFM’s feed library has been mapped one-to-one to those lists. Custom supplements cannot be flagged “grass-fed”. |
| Evidence & auditing |
Calculation methods for grass % and days grazing are locked into Schedules 1 & 3. |
Meat standard mirrors this with its own appendices. |
The same maths is now hard-coded into OverseerFM reports, so you can share them straight with an auditor. |
Further reading
-
Full New Zealand Dairy Grass-Fed Administrative Standard (34 pp PDF) - MPI, 10 June 2025. mpi.govt.nz
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One-page Dairy standard summary - quick reference card. mpi.govt.nz
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One-page Meat standard summary - quick reference card. mpi.govt.nz
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Overseer Knowledge-base article “What does ‘Grass-Fed’ mean?” support.overseer.org.nz