New Zealand’s pasture based systems aren’t exactly the idealistic visions people have of them. Even just environmentally, their attempts to scale them up have required huge amounts of fertilizer and lead to huge amounts of pollution. For instance for their dairy production:
The large footprint for milk in Canterbury indicates just how far the capacity of the environment has been overshot. To maintain that level of production and have healthy water would require either 12 times more rainfall in the region or a 12-fold reduction in cows.
[…]
The “grass-fed” marketing line overlooks the huge amounts of fossil-fuel-derived fertiliser used to make the extra grass that supports New Zealand’s very high animal stock rates.
New Zealand’s pasture based systems aren’t exactly the idealistic visions people have of them. Even just environmentally, their attempts to scale them up have required huge amounts of fertilizer and lead to huge amounts of pollution. For instance for their dairy production:
https://theconversation.com/11-000-litres-of-water-to-make-one-litre-of-milk-new-questions-about-the-freshwater-impact-of-nz-dairy-farming-183806