A great deal has been written on the subject of ‘Farming without Subsidies’ in New Zealand. This paper draws heavily on much of that work, particularly Sandry and Reynolds (1990), Meat and Wool NZ (2005), Vitalis (2005), Gould (1982), Johnson and Forbes (2000), Lattimore (1987), Rayner et al (1991), Evans et al (1996), Silverstone et al (1996), Federated Farmers (2002) and Morrison et al (2000). Dalziel and Lattimore (2004) has a comprehensive bibliography of the business, economic, sociology and political science literature on the subject. [...] The aim of this paper is to discuss why farm subsidies were raised so much at that time, why, and how, they were quickly removed after 1984 and what have been the resulting effects on the farm sector.
