Māori farming is operating across some of the largest agricultural landholdings in Aotearoa, with new Stats NZ figures revealing the average Māori farm is two-and-a-half times larger than the average New Zealand farm and carries substantially more forestry, bush and scrub.
The latest Tatauranga umanga Māori data provides a revealing snapshot of how Māori whenua is being used and managed, highlighting the distinctive role collectively owned land plays across agriculture, forestry and environmental stewardship.
At 30 June 2025, the average Māori farm covered 707 hectares, compared with 284 hectares across all New Zealand farms. Almost half of Māori farms are owned and operated by Māori authorities, which collectively manage assets held by Māori.
Māori farms are different
The numbers reveal that Māori farming cannot simply be viewed as a smaller version of conventional New Zealand agriculture.
While grassland remains the largest land-use category, it accounted for 48.9 percent of Māori farm area, compared with 54.1 percent across all farms.
The major difference emerges when forestry and native vegetation are examined.
Exotic forestry plantations accounted for 22.5 percent of Māori farm area, compared with just 14.6 percent nationally.
Meanwhile, bush and scrub covered 18.4 percent of Māori farm area — more than double the 8.9 percent recorded across all New Zealand farms.
Horticultural land represented 0.9 percent of Māori farm area, close to the 1 percent national figure. Other land accounted for 9.2 percent on Māori farms compared with 21.3 percent nationally.
Together, exotic forestry and bush and scrub account for more than 40 percent of Māori farm area.
That is a significant feature of the Māori primary sector and demonstrates that large Māori landholdings can simultaneously carry commercial production, forestry and extensive areas of vegetation.
More than a million sheep on Māori farms
Māori farms also remain significant livestock producers.
As at June 2025, they carried approximately 1.24 million sheep, representing 5.3 percent of New Zealand’s total sheep population.
They also carried:
- 206,600 beef cattle, or 5.4 percent of the national herd
- 160,100 dairy cattle, representing 2.8 percent
- 8,900 deer, or 1.2 percent of the country’s total.
The sheep numbers have fallen, but at a considerably slower rate than across the farming sector generally.
Since Stats NZ’s Tatauranga umanga Māori series began in 2017, sheep numbers on Māori farms have dropped 7.8 percent.
Across all New Zealand farms, sheep numbers declined 16 percent over the same period.
That means the decline in sheep numbers on Māori farms has been less than half the national percentage decline.
Collective ownership helps explain the scale
One of the most important pieces of context behind the figures is the nature of Māori land ownership.
Stats NZ says Māori authorities are economically significant businesses involved in collectively managing assets held by Māori, and almost half of Māori farms are owned and operated by Māori authorities.
That helps explain why the average Māori farming operation captured by the statistics is so much larger.
But size alone does not necessarily mean development is easier.
Collectively held whenua can operate within different ownership, governance and financing structures from conventional privately owned farms.
For Māori landowners, decisions around whenua can also extend well beyond maximising annual agricultural returns.
They can involve whakapapa, intergenerational ownership and the long-term future of whenua that has remained connected to whānau, hapū and iwi.
Forestry figures carry a bigger economic question
The high proportion of Māori land under exotic forestry is particularly significant.
With 22.5 percent of Māori farm area in exotic forestry plantations, Māori landowners are heavily exposed to decisions affecting forestry, carbon markets, land-use rules and the Emissions Trading Scheme.
Those policy debates can therefore have an outsized impact on Māori asset owners.
Forestry can provide an important commercial return from land that may be difficult to use for intensive pastoral agriculture. It can also offer opportunities through carbon income and long-term investment.
But the future of productive land, permanent forestry, harvesting, infrastructure and carbon policy has become increasingly politically contested.
The Stats NZ figures show why Māori need to be central to those conversations rather than treated as another stakeholder on the sidelines.
Native bush is part of the Māori farming story
Perhaps one of the most striking findings is the amount of bush and scrub remaining within Māori farms.
At 18.4 percent of total farm area, the proportion is more than twice the national figure.
That does not automatically tell us the ecological condition of that land, nor does the Stats NZ release establish why individual landowners have retained it.
But it does demonstrate the scale of vegetation sitting within Māori farming landscapes.
That creates an important intersection between the Māori economy and te taiao.
Future decisions around biodiversity, indigenous forests, pest control, freshwater, climate adaptation and carbon cannot be separated from the people who own and manage the whenua on which those environmental assets sit.
Whenua is an economic asset — but it is also intergenerational
The statistics provide another reminder of the scale and distinctive character of the Māori primary sector.
A 707-hectare average farm, substantial livestock holdings and much greater proportions of forestry and bush show Māori agribusiness occupying a significant position across rural Aotearoa.
But measuring Māori farming purely through livestock numbers or hectares risks missing part of the picture.
For many Māori entities, the whenua being managed today is intended to remain an asset for generations to come.
That can create a different investment horizon — one where commercial performance, environmental responsibility and intergenerational stewardship all have to coexist.
The opportunity is bigger than farming
The new Stats NZ figures also point towards a larger economic opportunity.
With Māori farming operations managing substantial areas of land, forestry and native vegetation, the potential extends across agriculture, forestry, biodiversity, carbon, renewable energy, horticulture, tourism and value-added food production.
The challenge is ensuring Māori landowners have access to the capital, infrastructure, technology and markets needed to turn that asset base into stronger returns for whānau while retaining control of the whenua.
As Election 2026 approaches, that makes Māori land development more than a rural policy issue.
It is a question about the future of the Māori economy, regional employment, environmental stewardship and economic rangatiratanga.
The latest statistics show the scale is already there.
Māori farms are larger, hold considerably more forestry and retain more than twice the proportion of bush and scrub found across New Zealand farms overall.
The next question is how Aotearoa ensures the owners of that whenua have the tools to realise its economic potential while protecting it for the generations still to come.
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Data Source: Stats NZ
