The country's largest family-owned dairying business, Crafar Farms, has been placed in receivership.
It has been reported that the business owes about $200 million.
Agriculture Minister David Carter last week ordered urgent inspections of all dairy farms owned by the Crafar family.
The secured creditors, Westpac, Rabobank and PGG Wrightson Finance, have appointed Michael Stiassny and Brendon Gibson of KordaMentha as receivers.
The Crafar family had already announced it was selling its 22 central North Island farms after a string of fines for breaching effluent discharge conditions.
And the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry is still deciding whether to prosecute after more than 100 starving calves had to be shot on a Crafar farm in Waikato.
Mr Stiassny says the receivership will have no impact on MAF's investigation. It will be business as usual for the farms, he says, while the investigation is carried out.
