Use these pages to find out more about how OVERSEER^® can help you

Nutrient Budgets

Nutrient budgets are an important tool in assessing the environmental impact and sustainability of agricultural management on a farm.

OVERSEER^® calculates on-farm budgets for a wide range of nutrients and farming systems (pastoral, arable/vegetable and fruit crops) based on data inputs readily available from the farm. Understanding the fate of these nutrients is an important precursor to developing a Nutrient Management Plan.

Greenhouse gas emissions

Agriculture contributes just under half of NZ’s total GHG emissions (48% calculated for 2007).

OVERSEER^® calculates and reports farm-level emissions for pastoral farms based on the standard National Inventory methodology, allowing users to identify major sources on farms and to test management strategies for decreasing emissions.

Maintenance fertiliser applications

Fertiliser best management practices should consider agronomic, environmental and economic factors which all underpin sustainable agriculture.

OVERSEER^® calculates maintenance nutrient applications for pastoral farms, i.e. the levels of nutrients required to maintain the current soil test values.

Though OVERSEER^® is a useful fertiliser planning tool on its own, additional software is used by feriliser companies to provide farm specific econometric information for further developing fertiliser recommendations.

Supporting farmers

OVERSEER^® is a valuable tool for farmers and their advisors in planning nutrient use and assessing the potential environmental losses.

Supporting environmental policy development

OVERSEER^® is increasingly used to support environmental policy, most notably around Lake Taupo and as a part of Horizons One Plan. Addressing the needs of farmers and environmental policy makers are not mutually exclusive.

OVERSEER use allows and provides farmers with greater flexibility and scope in their farming operations because environmental policy is based on meeting output targets rather than restricting a farm’s inputs.

Examples of OVERSEER^® in use

Cost benefit analysis

OVERSEER^® does not include economic analysis, so outputs needs to be combined with other economic models to assess impacts of options on the farm business. We are currently working on mechanisms to make automatic linkage with other proprietary software easier. These will be available in 2011.