Speaker 1: Kielder.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
Speaker 2: daily podcast.
Speaker 1: Presented by the New Zealand Herald.
Speaker 2: New Zealand is a farming country and that's not going
Speaker 2: to change anytime soon. Agriculture and the primary sector remain
Speaker 2: central to our international trade, with export revenue hitting a
Speaker 2: record fifty seven point eight billion dollars in the year.
Speaker 1: To June twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2: That number is expected to dip when the next figures
Speaker 2: are announced as the tough economic climate is.
Speaker 1: Felt throughout all parts of society.
Speaker 2: Looking to get the most out of both the primary
Speaker 2: sectors here and overseas is the Minister for Agriculture and Trade,
Speaker 2: Todd McLay.
Speaker 1: As he heads to field days this week.
Speaker 2: The Minister joins us today on the Front Page to discuss.
Speaker 1: The state of his key portfolios.
Speaker 2: Minister nearly seven months into the job now, and you've
Speaker 2: been on a few international trips in that time. Hey,
Speaker 2: when you talk trade over seas, how important are our
Speaker 2: primary sectors in those discussions?
Speaker 3: Well, two things are really important.
Speaker 4: One primary sector is an extremely important and valuable part
Speaker 4: of the New Zealand economy. And secondly, it's a really
Speaker 4: big part of our trade profile. If you think of
Speaker 4: it this way, eighty percent of every single plane that
Speaker 4: leaves an airport in New Zealand and eighty percent of
Speaker 4: every single ship that leaves every port in New Zealand
Speaker 4: is full with the goods from the primary sector that
Speaker 4: we are selling overseas, and that's its contribution. The second
Speaker 4: thing I think in every single market I've been in
Speaker 4: through the Middle East, Europe, and of course a lot
Speaker 4: through Asia is the very good high reputation New Zealand
Speaker 4: food and produce has has been safe, environmentally free, and
Speaker 4: increasingly now people starting to be aware that, you know,
Speaker 4: it is very good for climate change because of the
Speaker 4: low carbon footprint that we have. And so we're just
Speaker 4: going to make sure we keep talking those things up
Speaker 4: and doing what we do best in New Zealand innovating
Speaker 4: produce great things that the world's consumers want to buy
Speaker 4: and are willing to pay more for.
Speaker 2: Speaking of climate change, I know the government's just announced
Speaker 2: it will be keeping agriculture out of the New Zealand
Speaker 2: emissions trading scheme and will establish a new Pastoral Sector
Speaker 2: group to tackle biogenic methane.
Speaker 1: What's the reason for this?
Speaker 3: Well, two things.
Speaker 4: The first is we know that our food producers are
Speaker 4: some of the most carbon efficient producers of food anywhere
Speaker 4: in the world. And if what we do to meet
Speaker 4: our climate change obligations is have them produce less or
Speaker 4: close farms down, we know that that food we produce
Speaker 4: will be picked up by some other country and they
Speaker 4: will be you know, the climate will be worse off
Speaker 4: because they are less client carbon friendly, and Zealand will
Speaker 4: be poorer and we're just not willing to do that.
Speaker 4: But we must meet our obligations internationally to reach net
Speaker 4: zero by twenty fifty and we want to do that
Speaker 4: with the pastoral sector, which is the farmers that have
Speaker 4: dairy and meat. We want to do it in such
Speaker 4: a way as we reduce missions without reducing production, which
Speaker 4: predominantly is around new technologies that are available overseas and
Speaker 4: yet to be here, and through investing with them in
Speaker 4: more research and commercializing some of the things that are
Speaker 4: in labs in New Zealand now that will allow us
Speaker 4: to do that.
Speaker 2: Was the sector even a part of THEHS initiative to
Speaker 2: begin with.
Speaker 4: Well, the previous Labor government put them in as far
Speaker 4: as on the first of January next year. In twenty
Speaker 4: twenty five, if agriculture hadn't agreed a price to tax
Speaker 4: its climate or methane production, then the ETS would swing
Speaker 4: into effect.
Speaker 3: And we just think that's just far too blunt a tool.
Speaker 4: You know, if New Zealand was one of the worst
Speaker 4: carbon emitters when it came to agriculture, may be fair enough,
Speaker 4: but we're not. We're one of the most carbon efficient.
Speaker 4: And all it would do is push production to the
Speaker 4: US or to Europe, where we know that for every
Speaker 4: time they produce food they emit more carbon. That would
Speaker 4: be worse for climate change. But I come back to
Speaker 4: what I said earlier. We must meet our climate change obligations.
Speaker 4: The government has committed to that. Agriculture has said they
Speaker 4: will do their part, but we just have to do
Speaker 4: it in a way that it doesn't shut them down.
Speaker 3: And I know that there will be many things that
Speaker 3: they're up for around.
Speaker 4: Innovation and these new technologies that will help get us
Speaker 4: there by twenty fifty.
Speaker 2: The sector is one of the biggest in our country
Speaker 2: in terms of emitting meeting though right.
Speaker 4: Well, you know, agricultures is responsible about fifty percent of
Speaker 4: New Zealand's emissions, but they are not responsible for fifty
Speaker 4: percent of New Zealand's warming.
Speaker 5: Farmers don't dispute. They're responsible for nearly half of New
Speaker 5: Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions.
Speaker 3: And not responsible is as for half the warming.
Speaker 5: A report commissioned by Federated Farmers Dairy and z and
Speaker 5: Beef and Land New Zealand shows that since nineteen ninety
Speaker 5: farming has been responsible for forty nine percent of total emissions,
Speaker 5: but in that time the sector has been responsible for
Speaker 5: just thirty seven percent of warming.
Speaker 4: And that's why before the election we committed to an
Speaker 4: independent scientific review, an independent review of the science and
Speaker 4: targets of methane agriculture against additional warming, and Cabinet has
Speaker 4: made that decision already we're going through the terms of
Speaker 4: reference and we're looking for New Zealand and the world's
Speaker 4: best scientists in this area to conduct that independent review
Speaker 4: for us.
Speaker 3: What they will do is give us.
Speaker 4: Exactly the target of what agriculture must do, what they
Speaker 4: must reduce, or the amount they must reduce by. And
Speaker 4: you're going to remember the last government put in legislation
Speaker 4: a reduction of agricultural emissions of between twenty four and
Speaker 4: forty seven percent by twenty fifty. But that's not a target,
Speaker 4: that's a really wide band that sort of says, we
Speaker 4: don't really know what the target should be, so we'll
Speaker 4: chuck some stuff and legislation and we'll work it out
Speaker 4: later on. Well, we've said we want the world in
Speaker 4: New Zealand's best scientists to help us make that decision.
Speaker 4: We will accept the decision, you know, the advice they
Speaker 4: come up with, and then we will work with agriculture
Speaker 4: to ensure that they do their fair shared to help
Speaker 4: New Zealand meets climate reduction obligations, and we'll do so
Speaker 4: in such a way without sending those jobs and that
Speaker 4: production overseas.
Speaker 2: You said that the government is committing to meeting our
Speaker 2: climate change obligations, like you've just told us as well.
Speaker 2: But if farmers don't face consequences for their emissions, what
Speaker 2: incentive do they have to reduce them.
Speaker 4: Well, one of the most important incentives is access to
Speaker 4: foreign market. And I mentioned at the beginning of our
Speaker 4: top eighty percent of what we know we sell overseas
Speaker 4: as food and fiber, it comes from the primary sector.
Speaker 4: We know that customers overseas, and certainly consumers are recly
Speaker 4: interested in the environmental and climate change footprint, and although
Speaker 4: we are one of the world's most carbon efficient food producers,
Speaker 4: that's not enough.
Speaker 3: We need to do our fair share. And I know
Speaker 3: my conversations with the.
Speaker 4: Processors who export as well as the farmers and their
Speaker 4: farming leaders that represent them, they know that they have
Speaker 4: to do this.
Speaker 3: They're up for the challenge.
Speaker 4: They're just saying that a tax on food production, which
Speaker 4: is what the last government was proposing and driving through
Speaker 4: the utets, would merely put up prices for New Zealand
Speaker 4: consumers and our supermarkets, and would make us less productive
Speaker 4: overseas and wouldn't do anything at all to help the
Speaker 4: world reduce agricultural emissions.
Speaker 3: Well, we're being more responsible than that.
Speaker 4: We're saying that we're going to work with the sector
Speaker 4: set up a pricing regime by twenty thirty, but make
Speaker 4: sure that the New Zealand regulatory system and our investment
Speaker 4: allows some of those solutions that are available around the
Speaker 4: world but not yet in New Zealand there for farmers
Speaker 4: to take up.
Speaker 6: We need to embrace the technology and the tools that
Speaker 6: many other countries have. You know, there is technology that
Speaker 6: exists today as a methane inhibitor that will reduce emissions
Speaker 6: by thirty percent. It's available in thirty five other countries
Speaker 6: and it's not yet available here in Zealand. We need
Speaker 6: to give our farmers the tools and the technology to
Speaker 6: be able.
Speaker 3: To do that.
Speaker 2: The last government didn't seem to get along too well
Speaker 2: with the farming community at all. Hey, but Groundswell seems
Speaker 2: to be one of the few groups not protesting the
Speaker 2: government this time. What are you doing differently to work
Speaker 2: with the farming community. Do you reckon that differs from
Speaker 2: the last government?
Speaker 4: Well, I think that most of the groups that represent
Speaker 4: farmers from you know, directly on the farm to those
Speaker 4: that have officers in Wellington, the levy bodies, all they
Speaker 4: asked was the last government was to work constructively, you know,
Speaker 4: Labor set up a hare Walker ECONO, a partnership and
Speaker 4: they said it was the first true partnership with government
Speaker 4: of farmers anywhere in the world to find solutions together
Speaker 4: to reduce farm missions and scratching. Now, well we are
Speaker 4: and the reason for that is that the sector work
Speaker 4: for two or three years, came up with those solutions
Speaker 4: and the government said, no, we don't like it. The
Speaker 4: Labor government said we don't like it, and they destroyed
Speaker 4: any semblance of cooperation or good faith that existed. What
Speaker 4: that shows me though, is that the sector is willing
Speaker 4: to take on responsibility for itself and we are disbanding
Speaker 4: here Walker Econoa because it's failed. It didn't achieve what
Speaker 4: Labour said it would and I'm yet to see anybody
Speaker 4: that has any faith it. In fact, even James Shaw
Speaker 4: that was a member of the last government. Now if
Speaker 4: Parliament said it didn't achieve the things that needed to,
Speaker 4: it didn't work out. In its place, we have a
Speaker 4: new Pastoral Sector group that will be representatives at a
Speaker 4: very high level of only those farmers involved with the dairy, sheep,
Speaker 4: beef and there because that's where the methane shall and
Speaker 4: we will work constructively and focus with them on these solutions.
Speaker 4: But the sector knows and it has already said it
Speaker 4: must meet its obligations. Are They're up for that, but
Speaker 4: they need a government that will work with them. Merely
Speaker 4: putting a tax on them that puts up the price
Speaker 4: of food and sends jobs and production over seas won't
Speaker 4: achieve that.
Speaker 3: It'll just make New Zealand poorer.
Speaker 2: How does it put a higher price on food though
Speaker 2: being more environmentally friendly. Do you think other nations, perhaps
Speaker 2: in exporting, wouldn't choose New Zealand because it's not doing
Speaker 2: enough for the environment.
Speaker 4: Well, no, it makes food more expensive for New Zealand
Speaker 4: consumers and makes us less competitive over seas when we export.
Speaker 4: So think of it this way. It's a bit like
Speaker 4: that ut tax. The last government put a tax on utes.
Speaker 4: If people want to buy them and drive them, or
Speaker 4: a farmer or a tradee there is nothing else they
Speaker 4: can buy because there wasn't electorates. All they have to
Speaker 4: do is pay a tax, pass that on to the
Speaker 4: consumers or the people they're providing services to, because they're
Speaker 4: not able to alter their behavior. In the case of
Speaker 4: the last gouvernm with agriculture by saying they were putting
Speaker 4: a price on agriculture, if there was nothing they could
Speaker 4: do other than farm less and produce less food. Then
Speaker 4: merely it puts up the price of food for New Zealanders,
Speaker 4: or we.
Speaker 3: Are less competitive overseas.
Speaker 4: Are here blessed to sell And as I said earlier,
Speaker 4: because we are so carbon efficient, it means the Americans
Speaker 4: or the Europeans would produce that food that world needs
Speaker 4: and with a greater carbon footprint, which is worse for
Speaker 4: climate change. Well, we're not willing to do that. But
Speaker 4: I come back to what I have said each time
Speaker 4: and repeat. We must meet our obligations. The sect there
Speaker 4: says they're up to that. We're going to work with
Speaker 4: them on this on methane and use these new technologies
Speaker 4: and make sure the tools are available to them so
Speaker 4: that we can get to the target of net zero
Speaker 4: on behalf of New Zealand by twenty fifty.
Speaker 2: And one of the arguments the previous government used around
Speaker 2: the emissions trading scheme and other policies was that the
Speaker 2: New Zealand trades on its clean green image and farming
Speaker 2: needs to reflect that.
Speaker 1: Right Do you agree with that perspective?
Speaker 4: Yes, I do, And we start from a very good
Speaker 4: point in as far as we are one of the
Speaker 4: world's most carbon efficient food producers. But we can't merely
Speaker 4: say we're better than the rest of you. Therefore we're
Speaker 4: not going to do anything. We have obligations and we
Speaker 4: have to do our fear share.
Speaker 3: That's in it.
Speaker 2: It's just not in the scheme of the ets, right,
Speaker 2: you're going to make them do other things. Does the
Speaker 2: clean green image come up at all when you talk
Speaker 2: with other countries.
Speaker 1: Has that resonated overseas well?
Speaker 4: Certainly consumers around the world recognizes that New Zealand produces
Speaker 4: very high quality save food and they recognize also that
Speaker 4: we have high environmental standards. We need to keep enforcing
Speaker 4: those and reinforcing them. But we also have to be
Speaker 4: focused on the outcome, what we're trying to achieve, rather
Speaker 4: than just a rule that often won't achieve what has
Speaker 4: been suggested or just add cost. But we are thought
Speaker 4: of very highly internationally. It is a reputation that has
Speaker 4: developed and built upon by successive governments from the work
Speaker 4: the sector.
Speaker 3: And farmers do themselves.
Speaker 4: We need to support that with good regulation and enhance it,
Speaker 4: but not merely put in place rules that would create
Speaker 4: attax and not achieve the things we need to.
Speaker 2: And if we go back overseas and talk trade for
Speaker 2: a minute, Minister, how's the mission to woo India going?
Speaker 4: Well, it's very you look at We're in a really
Speaker 4: really good space, I think, but there's a lot of
Speaker 4: work to be done. It's fair to say over the
Speaker 4: last six to seven years, the relationship with India was underdone.
Speaker 4: Prime Minister Luxeen has been very clear we want to
Speaker 4: invest in that relationship and it is a strategic priority
Speaker 4: for the government. I've been up there very soon after
Speaker 4: the government's formed last year.
Speaker 3: Deputy Prime Minister Peters has paid a visit.
Speaker 4: When I was there, I met with my counterpart, the
Speaker 4: Commerce Minister, and I invited him to send a delegation
Speaker 4: of his high level officials to New Zealand to meet
Speaker 4: with my trailer officials and talk about trade more broadly,
Speaker 4: but also focus on some of the barriers that exist
Speaker 4: that make it hard for New Zealanders to export to
Speaker 4: India or Indians to New Zealand. That visit happened about
Speaker 4: a month ago. It was very constructive. Since we've come
Speaker 4: to government, the log trade has recommenced because India had
Speaker 4: restricted logs from New Zealand. We've been able to find
Speaker 4: a few products, including mangos, that can come down in
Speaker 4: this direction. And the Prime Minister has said he will
Speaker 4: visit India within a year of becoming Prime minister, and
Speaker 4: that is scheduled with a big delegation before the end
Speaker 4: of this year. So we're making important steps forward. The
Speaker 4: end goal is a high quality trade agreement with India.
Speaker 4: But before we can get to the stage of talking
Speaker 4: trade and negotiating, we have to strengthen the relationship and
Speaker 4: get ready for a ways that Kiwis and Indians can
Speaker 4: buy and sell more from each other.
Speaker 2: If you had a genie pop out of a bottle
Speaker 2: and you could sign a trade agreement with any country
Speaker 2: in the world that you're working on now, who's on
Speaker 2: the top of the list.
Speaker 4: It would be India because they're one point four billion
Speaker 4: consumers who are increasing in wealth. They're starting to trade
Speaker 4: with the world, buy and sell, and that we know that.
Speaker 4: You know that there is real opportunity for Kiwi exporters
Speaker 4: of goods and of services.
Speaker 3: In that market.
Speaker 4: But the other area that I think would be very
Speaker 4: important for me is rather than a trade deal with
Speaker 4: one countries, I'd want to continue to bring groups of
Speaker 4: countries together to have common rules through trade that give
Speaker 4: certainty and opens up supply chains to many more New
Speaker 4: Zealand exporters. You know, we don't have a trade deal
Speaker 4: with the US, although since they pulled out of the
Speaker 4: TPP seven years ago, our trade with them has grown
Speaker 4: remarkably well. But we did the last week in Singapore
Speaker 4: and I was there sign a deal with fourteen Indo
Speaker 4: Pacific countries, including India and the US, which looks area
Speaker 4: to cooperate and gives greater certainty for trade and particularly
Speaker 4: investment in the green economy. That's a pretty important step
Speaker 4: forward for a small country like New Zealand. We're going
Speaker 4: to keeping out on the world stage hustling for a
Speaker 4: better deal for keywags. It's something the prime minister election
Speaker 4: is pushing the Deputy Prime Minister and me as Trade
Speaker 4: Minister to do every single.
Speaker 7: Day, because if it's splitzing growth rates, the fast is
Speaker 7: doing economy of the world. A country of one point
Speaker 7: four billion people who are upwardly mobile, several hundred million
Speaker 7: people coming up into the middle plus every decade. It's
Speaker 7: a huge market which cannot be ignored. In fact, it's
Speaker 7: a little surprise that it has taken New Zealand so
Speaker 7: long to come to the party.
Speaker 2: And you're off to Field Days obviously a massive event
Speaker 2: for the sector on everyone's calendars every year.
Speaker 1: I what are you looking most forward to?
Speaker 2: What do you reckon the reception is to you being
Speaker 2: there will be and any announcements coming out.
Speaker 4: Yeah, my first Field Days as Agriculture Minister. Although I've
Speaker 4: been there previously spoke and of course there's an MP
Speaker 4: many times before. It's a real celebration of the very
Speaker 4: best at new rural New Zealand has to offer. I
Speaker 4: have nothing but admiration for New Zealand farmers. You know,
Speaker 4: they innovate, they work very very hard every day, they
Speaker 4: get up so early, and they are helping us rebuild
Speaker 4: the economy and pay off a lot of the debt
Speaker 4: that's been run up. But there will be a number
Speaker 4: of announcements as we go through the week. The Prime
Speaker 4: Minister will be there Wednesday, which is our full day,
Speaker 4: and I tell you, aside from our announcements, what he
Speaker 4: and I are both most looking forward to is being
Speaker 4: able to get out and talk to farmers directly about
Speaker 4: the things that they're doing well, the challenges that they
Speaker 4: have and what more they want from the government.
Speaker 1: And any hints on what those announcements will entail.
Speaker 4: Well, some of them are going to be around support
Speaker 4: on farm and new ways of doing things. Nothing overly significant,
Speaker 4: but I do have announcements towards the end of the
Speaker 4: week around forestry. There's a forestry hub there and it's
Speaker 4: what we're doing in agriculture, given certainty, getting some of
Speaker 4: the rules that aren't working just costs, creating costs out
Speaker 4: of the way and setting up a framework so foresters
Speaker 4: as much as farmers have a clear understanding of what
Speaker 4: their obligations are and then can make decisions for themselves
Speaker 4: how to best meet them. You know, where the cost
Speaker 4: of a regulation is greater than the benefit of the outcome,
Speaker 4: that's red tape, and the government is just not going
Speaker 4: to do that. But we're not saying we shouldn't have rules.
Speaker 4: We're saying we want better rules. We're not saying that
Speaker 4: we only want you know, fewer, we want ones that
Speaker 4: really really work. And that's the same whether it's in
Speaker 4: any part of the business community, agriculture, forestry, or actually
Speaker 4: mom and dad at home. You know, they know they
Speaker 4: have to be rules on regulations. They want to be
Speaker 4: smarter and better. They don't just want them to be
Speaker 4: expensive and burdensome. And that's everything that David Seymour that
Speaker 4: our Prime Minister Christoph Luxan and Deputy Prime Minister Winston
Speaker 4: Peters and.
Speaker 3: I are focused on geling along then very much so.
Speaker 4: Tell you I've been in three governments now and this
Speaker 4: is a privilege and of pleasure to be a member
Speaker 4: of the focus around the Cabinet table on getting things
Speaker 4: done for New Zealanders and making their lives easier by
Speaker 4: having less government, but where they do need government that
Speaker 4: we work harder for them is a pleasure.
Speaker 2: You can tell us the Gossip of tape. Thanks minister,
Speaker 2: You're so welcome. That's it for this episode of the
Speaker 2: Front Page. You can read more about today's stories and
Speaker 2: extensive news coverage at enzet Herald dot co dot z.
Speaker 2: The Front Page is produced by Ethan Sells with sound
Speaker 2: engineer Patty Fox.
Speaker 1: I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2: Subscribe to The Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
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Speaker 2: behind the headlines.