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Speaker 1: Right now. As I mentioned at the start of the show,

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Speaker 1: the Housing Minister is going to open up a whole

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Speaker 1: swath of New Zealand land for housing developments. Basically, what

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Speaker 1: the argument is, we can only do so much with

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Speaker 1: our food. We need places to live. All the land

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Speaker 1: in New Zealand is rated on an eight point scale.

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Speaker 1: One is the best, eight is rubbish. At the moment.

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Speaker 1: You can build on one, you sorry can't build on one,

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Speaker 1: two or three, as that land is considered two good

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Speaker 1: for growing things on. Chris Bishop is going to leave

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Speaker 1: one and two alone, but he's keen to allow some

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Speaker 1: building on three, which is significant because three makes up

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Speaker 1: two thirds of all of this land. Johannah King is

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Speaker 1: the RMA lawyer, senior Associate at Taverndale and Partners, and

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Speaker 1: she's with me to talk us through the detail of

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Speaker 1: this tonight. Johannah, good evening.

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Speaker 2: Good evening, Ryan. How are you?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, good, thank you. I heard you've been at Field days.

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Speaker 1: How's it been we.

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Speaker 3: Have, It's been greater here actually though the rain's just

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Speaker 3: crept in and so we've timed.

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Speaker 1: It right nice. I'm glad you had a good day.

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Speaker 1: Tell us about the land that the ministers referring to here.

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Speaker 1: How much are we talking about? How significant is this?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, these Class three soils that there are in quite

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Speaker 3: a few places actually, Ryan So I mean places like

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Speaker 3: south of Bukakoi. We've got the whited Upper Manowitou, Theams,

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Speaker 3: places like Wayouku. Also a lot in the South Island

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Speaker 3: with mid Canterabrien ash Burton blend him in Southland.

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Speaker 2: You mentioned some figures before and I don't doubt that

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Speaker 2: those are on the money.

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Speaker 3: So there's a lot of land here, but it is

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Speaker 3: those Class three soils you were talking about. So we've

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Speaker 3: still got some decent, some good land to do with farming.

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Speaker 3: But it's all it's all potentially coming up for up

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Speaker 3: for grabs.

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Speaker 1: That's the thing. So the minister has said, not that

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Speaker 1: we'll throw the baby out with the bath water. He's

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Speaker 1: coming up with this new idea of special agricultural zones

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Speaker 1: which are going to consult on. So if the land,

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Speaker 1: if some of this land is all together, you know,

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Speaker 1: and we're talking you mentioned Pokakoe or hot A Fenoa,

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Speaker 1: this agricultural land is altogether, then that would be get

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Speaker 1: a special protection. But could this potentially benefit farmers who

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Speaker 1: have just a little bit of Level three land and

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Speaker 1: they want to build on it and at the moment

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Speaker 1: they can't. Is that a potential here?

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Speaker 2: Yes, I think that is a potential. Ryan.

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Speaker 3: We're actually seeing a fair bit of that here in Kenterbury,

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Speaker 3: where you might have farmers who have some Class one,

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Speaker 3: two and three across farm and they can't currently say

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Speaker 3: subdivided piece off for mum and dad to retire onto

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Speaker 3: or something like that. So there have been some outcomes

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Speaker 3: that have been quite difficult to reconcile with what our

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Speaker 3: farmers need and want down here. But certainly yeah, we're

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Speaker 3: seeing we would see that change in future if this

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Speaker 3: all comes through those.

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Speaker 2: Agricultural protection areas.

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Speaker 3: It will be good to see that consultation go ahead

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Speaker 3: because there could well be some good areas do afford

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Speaker 3: that protection with Class three to be bundled together with

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Speaker 3: existing Class one and two. So it will be good

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Speaker 3: to see that process play out.

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Speaker 1: Is there a risk we could build right on top

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Speaker 1: of productive soil that would be better used for growing something.

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Speaker 2: Oh, look, that's the golden question, isn't it. I think

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Speaker 2: that's always a risk Brian.

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Speaker 3: Once we have land that goes into lifestyle blocks, or

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Speaker 3: into residential housing. It's virtually impossible to revert back into

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Speaker 3: land grower for growing use, so there's always a cost

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Speaker 3: benefit analysis to be done. But in saying that, also

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Speaker 3: we've got to remember there's a lot of innovation happening

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Speaker 3: in the primary sector. There's also a lot of farmers

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Speaker 3: doing a lot more with Class four soils as well,

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Speaker 3: so we could see that we maximize more with what

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Speaker 3: we have, things like vertical gardening and all that sort.

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Speaker 2: Of thing could become. It could be quite as good

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Speaker 2: salve on all this as well.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I was going to mean, well, I didn't want

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Speaker 1: to mention it because people don't like the idea, but

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Speaker 1: vertical gut. I mean, we may not even need any

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Speaker 1: any level one, two or three soil.

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Speaker 2: It's a tricky one, isn't it.

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Speaker 3: But I think we've got to have a lot of

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Speaker 3: levers to pull in certain sort of options, and I

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Speaker 3: think the more innovation that happens, the more options.

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Speaker 2: We will have.

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Speaker 1: Nice one, Johannah, I'm going and enjoy the rest of

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Speaker 1: your rainy field days. We appreciate you being with us.

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Speaker 1: Thanks very much, Ryan, Johannah King, who's the rm A

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Speaker 1: lawyer Senior associate at Taverndale and Partners.

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Speaker 2: For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive.

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Speaker 1: Listen live to news talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays,

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