The 23-year-old was blown away when he heard his name called at the Ashburton awards last week.
"It feels awesome. It was such a numbing feeling receiving the award," Mr Smith said.
It came after a selection process on a practical skills day which included loading quadbikes, making pasture calculations and completing feed and winter feed budgets, plus a general knowledge test.
The top six for the awards final were then selected for an interview and from there the winner was chosen.
"It was a bit of an anxious wait, I guess, for a month," Mr Smith said.
He has worked for the past 18 months as 2IC and irrigation manager for Matt and Julie Ross at Duntroon.
They have 1800 cows across two farms.
Originally from Whangarei, Mr Smith studied a bachelor of commerce (agriculture) at Lincoln University.
He said having dyslexia made completing his degree a challenge, but was one he was proud to have overcome.
While at university he also co-founded Ag Assist in 2021 with the idea to help farms find relief milkers.
"Basically making a platform that can make it accessible for farmers to go on and select workers.
"Kind of like Uber for farming. Farmers rate them and the workers rate the farmers."
While he has taken a step back from Ag Assist, he is still a shareholder and has enjoyed seeing it grow.
Mr Smith and his partner, Kayla, are hopping on a plane to Western Australia in June to do a cattle muster.
The pair have also lined up a harvest job before flying to Ireland at the start of next year for calving. They will be away about a year.
The idea was to experience dairy farming in a different country first and do a bit of travel.
Mr Smith was excited about the future of the industry in New Zealand.
"There’s not many industries that you could say you can potentially have the ability to get into farm ownership.
"It’s awesome. I’m just really looking forward to what comes from here."
