In what may well have been a foretaste of the election campaign, a relaxed and confident Prime Minister turned up at the Farm Field Days in Hamilton yesterday and turned a blue-green face to the crowd.
Instead of his usual robotic corporate speak, Christopher Luxon was full of aspiration and encouragement to farmers to embrace tech so they could continue to lead the world and be the motor that drove the New Zealand economy and be sustainable at the same time.
He was so relaxed, he was even prepared in front of the Waikato crowd to back the Crusaders against the local Chiefs in the Super Rugby semi-final on Friday night.
Of course, he had reason to relax, farm incomes across all the sectors are up, and today’s six-monthly Ministry of Primary Industries Situation and Outlook report is expected to confirm that farmers are enjoying a particularly buoyant time at present.
Luxon himself will launch that report.
“We now have a trade surplus for the first time in five years, and even in the middle of a fuel crisis in April, we had a two billion dollar trade surplus, a lot of it to do with the efficiency and the great products that we’re selling out to the world from here,” he said, speaking to journalists at the Field Days.
But underlying everything yesterday was a debate about methane emissions kicked off by ACT.
Luxon rejected ACT’s proposals and went full Blue-Green in response.
ACT wants to have different rules for methane than carbon dioxide and would have the methane targets set on the basis of how much warming the gas contributes to the atmosphere.
The argument reduces methane’s negative impact compared to carbon dioxide because, as a short-lived gas, it produces much less warming over a long period of time than carbon dioxide.
Therefore farmers would not need to reduce methane emissions by much if at all.
This has long been advocated by Canterbury University Physics Professor David Frame and is supported by Federated Farmers.
But ACT has added a sting in the tale.
If New Zealand could not get this accepted within the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, we should pull out of Paris, it said in a media release yesterday issued to coincide with Field Days.
NZ First Leader Winston Peters has also called on the Government to re-evaluate New Zealand’s Paris Commitments, heavily implying that we should leave if we can’t get that re-evaluation to take place.
But Luxon yesterday rejected any idea that we abandon the Paris Agreement.
He echoed the argument put forward by Fonterra CEO Richard Allen yesterday that our major customers and our important trade agreements all demanded that we uphold the Paris Agreement.
“For us, it’s in our interest to stay here in Paris,” he said.
And though New Zealand is having difficulty meeting emissions targets set for 2030, Luxon yesterday committed his Government to working towards meeting the 2050 net zero targets.
“We’ve got a wee way to go, sure, but we’re going to keep going, and we’re going to do everything we possibly can,” he said.
“But I also say our commitment is delivering on net zero 2050.
“Different plans that we’ve seen suggest that we could get there earlier.”
Luxon was clearly excited by one product on display at Field Days from Auckland-based Ruminant Biotech, which has developed a chewable product that can be administered to cattle once every three months and which is showing a 70 per cent reduction in methane gases.
So whereas ACT and NZ First simply want cattle emissions calculated differently, National still wants them reduced, and Luxon told his Field Days audiences that technologies like Ruminant Biotech, rather than levies or taxes, would be the way to go.
“In our Agri Zero fund, we’ve got, I think, up to $450 million with 16 to 18 projects,” he said.
“We’ve now moved them from ideas into really testable projects, and some of them are now ready to be deployed.
“We think we can be more sustainable, and we think we could be more productive at the same time by adopting more technology.”
The high-tech theme was continued in another policy he announced to a lunch of agriculture industry leaders.
This is a joint venture with the private sector and Māori, with the Government committing $59 million and the sector contributing $84 million to run pilot projects demonstrating land use flexibility.
“To date, productivity in the agriculture sector has grown more than almost every other part of New Zealand’s economy since records began,” he said.
“And we want to continue and to improve on this impressive track record. And that’s why the Government’s not content to simply sit back and admire the opportunity. We are acting on it.”
“We’re investing more than $140 million in commercial land use flexibility projects to give farmers and landowners more options, more confidence and more freedom to respond to market signals and future opportunities,” he said.
The partnerships span dairy, sheep and beef, horticulture, forestry and aquaculture and include projects such as dams, the use of virtual fencing and integrating on-orchard innovation, advanced decision-support tools, and new science.
Dan Boulton, the CEO of one company participating in the projects, Silver Fern Farms, said land use was not fixed.
“It can be more flexible and responsive to the markets, the science and the environment,” he said.
“And it says New Zealand doesn’t need to win by being the biggest, we can win by being the smartest, the most innovative, the most trusted and the most connected with our customers.”
Boulton said the policy gave food and fiber producers more choice.
“Choice how they use their land, choice how they lift productivity, choice in how they respond to change in markets, and just as importantly, it gives them a pathway to do that without impacting or increasing environmental impact,” he said.
“The combination of productivity, profitability, and sustainability is where real value lies.”
The concept of farmers as environmentalists is a deeply held view among many farmers and is exemplified by the QE2 Trust, through which farmers voluntarily lock up blocks of land with bush or other natural features.
National has announced that it will double the funding for the trust after the election. The money is used to draw up the legal agreements and to survey and fence the blocks that are to be locked up.
“I think the realization is that our farmers are some of our best environmentalists and actually it’s practical, pragmatic environmentalism and so when you see things like the work of catchment groups, when you the work of QE2 Trust, you know, work that’s been going on for over 50 years, when think about the Wilding Pines Challenge and all the community groups that are out there doing something about that and again you guys have been a big part of that,” he said at the Federated Farmers Q+A session.
“We’ve got to work together as an ecosystem. Your Government doesn’t do it all.”
Luxon told the farmers he wanted them to produce more, but he also wanted that to be done sustainably.
“We want you to produce more,” he said.
“You know, this notion that was previously in place under Labor that you can shrink farming or send off 30% or shut 30% of our farms down because of emissions, well we’re interested in growth, we are interested in creating jobs, we’re interested in lifting incomes, and for that to happen, we want you produce more, and you should do so sustainably,” he said.
“ And we’ll do that through embracing technology. “
And the farmers got treated to what seemed in his several appearances through the day to be his, and therefore presumably National’s core philosophy.
“I’m unapologetic about it; we have to make this country more prosperous,” he said.
“ We have to lift the floor and raise the living standards for all of us, because we’re all working really hard, but in the last 30 years, under successive governments of different colors and flavors, we’ve actually failed to lift productivity in the country and, as a result, create wealth and opportunity for ourselves.
“And why is that so important?
“It’s important for our kids and our grandkids, right, because we want them to have a better future in this country than we had.
“And there’s no excuse for why that can’t happen if you’re prepared to make some tough choices and get on and get things done and stop talking about stuff. And it’s as simple as that.”
Luxon is coming back for more today.
He has made a big commitment to these Field Days, and National has a roster of Ministers and MPs there with him.
The farmers are National’s base and in the past have quietly complained that they weren’t being taken seriously enough by the party.
These Field Days show that it has changed.
