Farmbiz is a division of Lowe and Associates Accountants Limited. We have offices in Ashburton and Christchurch and are members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of New Zealand and the New Zealand Institute of Primary Industry Management.

In 1998 we established a specialist section within our practice to provide specific business services and advice to the rural sector that compliment and extend on our core tax compliance and accounting services that we already provide. Farmbiz has become what we believe to be the shape of the modern rural consultancy-strategic business solutions tailored for our agricultural clients integrated with Chartered Accountancy services.

The purpose of this web site is to bring to your attention services that are essential to the operation of your farming business. They consist of up to date and modern business systems applied to agriculture. However, those systems are not a simple transplant of methods straight out of other business applications - they are designed to suit agriculture.

The approach to agriculture in New Zealand is heavily influenced by global trends. The governance and systemisation of farming businesses has become critical to the survivability and profitability of those businesses. New Zealand has many advantages; it has world class science; a highly educated and experienced farming population; and a benign climate. It has, relative to the rest of the world, less harsh community demands of landowners, despite the frustrations of the Resource Management Act. We do not have the extreme pressures on land from dense populations that are common elsewhere.

All that these advantages do though is give us some time to implement thoroughly high class business systems into farming.

The introduction of governance and planning systems into agriculture should not be viewed either as an imposition or negatively. Although a changing regulatory framework may have provided an impetus, in reality there is so much profitability potential in agriculture using such systems that the process should be very rewarding.