Farm IQ has met its first year's goals, with 174 farmers registered and 20,000 sheep, cattle and deer electronically ear-tagged to monitor their performance.
Silver Fern Farms integrated category manager Grant Howie said the level of support meant it had met its first-year goals as set out in the primary growth partnership (PGP) scheme.
More than 600 people attended 10 roadshows around the country in the past few weeks, attendances ranging from 30 at Wyndham to 120 at Darfield.
Mr Howie said the tagging of sheep, cattle and deer would allow them to be tracked and basic performance data collected for comparisons between regions and breeds to be made.
"Ultimately, we will get a report, for example, comparing lambs fed grass, chicory or, say, lucerne, but, in year one, the real basics of it is to set up the data collection system and the first round of reports."
The type of data collected and volume would evolve and grow each year, he said, which was the point of difference between it and other similar schemes.
Silver Fern Farms (SFF) has joined Landcorp and PGG Wrightson in forming Farm IQ, a separate company to run the seven-year project to improve the red meat sector's performance.
It was backed by $68 million from SFF, $60 million from the Government and $24 million from the other two partners.
Mr Howie said an example of change the PGP was driving was with dairy bull beef.
The current system relied on a calf rearer, nursery grower and finisher all making a financial margin, something that did not always happen and resulted in an uneven flow of bulls.
The number of bulls supplied to meatworks had fallen 8% a year for the past four years.
SFF has secured a guaranteed price over two years for the bull beef by a buyer keen to access secure, safe New Zealand beef.
"It's a big volume, basic product, but you can add value to these products by managing the international value chain."
Farm IQ was monitoring the performance of calves and will get input for farmers from experts in calf rearing, genetics and forage.
"We will get the whole value chain to work."
That will be underpinned by price certainty from the customer.
Gains from meat taste and quality testing panels would also be more rapid because of the scale offered by the PGP, Mr Howie said.
Last season, cuts from 2500 lambs were subjected to testing by SFF but this would ultimately grow under Farm IQ this year and in subsequent years and include venison and beef.
More variables would also be measured to include age, genetics and regional differences along with attributes such as taste, juiciness, odour and colour.
Mr Howie said it was part of the company's plate-to-pasture philosophy, acknowledging that the value chain started with the consumer and the need to increase the "size of the pie" by having a product consumers would pay more for.
Gains would also come for farmers from improved on-farm productivity.
Some farmers said they had already increased production, for example by lambing hoggets, but Marlborough farmer Doug Avery responded that when he started lambing hoggets he was achieving 40%, but now got 160%.
Mr Howie responded to criticism the PGP was replicating work done by others by saying if that were the case, the Government would not have contributed $60 million.