Rick Wilson (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Water Resources, I wish to make a statement concerning the committee's visit to New Zealand. As a farmer myself, I've always looked at New Zealand agriculture with envy. They certainly seem to have a much greater focus from their government on agriculture. That's of no surprise, of course, when you learn that 70 per cent of their export income is earnt from agriculture. They not only have always seemed to get better trade access, particularly in the European Union—and I know that, as a lamb producer, I've often been frustrated and envious of the fact that they get a much greater quota into the European Union—but also had a free trade deal with China many years before our government successfully negotiated a free trade agreement with China. One important point to note that we learnt while we were in New Zealand is that the dairy industry there has grown by 300 per cent since the year 2000.

The visit was hosted by the New Zealand parliament, and I especially want to thank the Speaker of the New Zealand parliament, the Rt Hon. David Carter, for his welcome and hospitality. Mr Speaker, I can assure you that your undoubted hospitality to other delegations that have visited our parliament was reciprocated very much in kind by David Carter, and I do thank him.

We did learn some interesting facts about the New Zealand political system and how it differs from ours. We all know that it not only is a unicameral parliament but also has a dual voting system which, in some respects, replicates our Senate and House and brings them together in one parliament, which seems to give them more flexibility to get things done, as we've seen in recent years. Perhaps that's something that we should consider. However, New Zealand doesn't have a written constitution, which allows much greater flexibility to make those sorts of changes.

While we were in the New Zealand parliament, we also met with the Minister for Primary Industries, Nathan Guy, and discussed issues around biosecurity. Of course, uppermost in their mind, at the moment, is the incursion of myrtle rust. We also discussed trade issues and some of the opportunities that might come around the Brexit issues and our country's new country-of-origin food-labelling system and how that might impact on New Zealand. We also met with the New Zealand Primary Production Committee, which is chaired by Mr Ian McKelvie MP. That was a very interesting discussion, given that parliamentary committees in the New Zealand parliament have a more important role, I guess you could say, in developing legislation and policy. Once legislation is introduced into the parliament by the minister, it is then automatically referred to the committee who conducts public hearings, takes public submissions, gathers evidence and then goes back to the minister with a recommendation. Once again, many members of our committee thought that that was a good system.

Of course, the main focus of our visit, complementary with our current inquiry, was looking at water resources and the most efficient use of water resources. Of course, in New Zealand they have a different set of challenges and circumstances. They only capture three per cent of the water that falls and utilise that in agriculture. Of course, we have to make sure we use every single drop here that falls. Once again, they are looking at—

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We don't use any in North Queensland! We use 0.5 in North Queensland!

Rick Wilson (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We're looking at, the member for Kennedy, capturing more water here and using that water more efficiently, as the Deputy Prime Minister has been talking about for some time. But New Zealand irrigation encaptures about five per cent of their arable area, whereas in Australia it's around one per cent of our arable area, so it is an important sector. Of course, as the intensification of agriculture occurs, they're having challenges around the contamination of water courses and other things.

I'm going to leave it to the Deputy Chair of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Water Resources to mention some of the particular visits and site visits that we did, but I just want to run through some thank yous before I wind up. I particularly want to thank Ruth Lewis from the visits and ceremonies office in New Zealand, who was fantastic and did a wonderful job of running the trip smoothly; Winton Holmes from the clerk's office of the New Zealand parliament, who was also there to support and advise us as we travelled around; His Excellency Peter Woolcott, the Australian High Commissioner to New Zealand, and, particularly, his staff Ms Anna Brown and Ms Alison Duncan for their support and advice during the trip; and, of course, our own Anthony Overs and the secretariat here in our Parliament House, along with the international parliamentary office, who made all the arrangements for a very smooth, very informative and worthwhile visit.

I just want to conclude by saying that New Zealand is our closest friend in the international community. We compete fiercely on the sporting field and in the trade field, but we have many, many common interests and we can certainly work together to achieve those interests.

Justine Keay (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We had a very thorough, comprehensive and informative trip to New Zealand, but I have to say I've never come across so much hatred for our beloved possums as you find in New Zealand. But New Zealand has an ambitious plan to become predator-free by 2050, and that is through removing all of those introduced species. Our two countries collaborate very strongly on biosecurity, which is very, very important. As the chair has mentioned, New Zealand has seen an incursion of myrtle rust in the last four or five months. There is a strong collaboration with Australia on how to manage that, with the aim of eradication. This has to happen because myrtle rust will have a significant economic impact on the Manuka honey production in that country. Manuka honey, we found, can fetch up to $1,000 per kilo.

Biosecurity was raised in nearly every meeting that we had, particularly with the politicians that we met and in particular the Minister for Primary Industries, the Hon. Nathan Guy MP. As I am from Tasmania, I dared not mention apples while I was there. We won't go into that! The committee met with members of the New Zealand parliamentary committee on primary production, chaired by Mr Ian McKelvie MP and the Hon. Damien O'Connor MP, and we discussed the issues of interest to our committee—water-use efficiencies, country-of-origin food labelling and export market access. The New Zealand parliament are keen to look at how they may introduce similar country-of-origin food labelling. Although perhaps it is not as thorough as what we have, a private member's bill introduced by Green Party MP Mr Steffan Browning is a start. The bill may not be dealt with before the upcoming election, but it's certainly one for us to monitor.

Given the committee's current inquiry into irrigation and water efficiencies, we met with a number of people in this space, in particular Irrigation New Zealand's Deputy Chair, Hugh Ritchie, and its CEO, Andrew Curtis. Like most of Australia, New Zealand have an abundance of water resources supporting intensive agricultural production, which makes up about 6.5 per cent of their GDP but dominates New Zealand exports. The challenge, as we heard from just about everyone we met, is with water quality. New Zealand is less driven by water-use efficiency but the heat—the political and public heat—is on quality, the discharge into rivers and the recharge into aquifers. This will drive efficiencies, maybe not to achieve a reduction in volumes but to manage nutrient load. This in turn will drive innovation and technology in New Zealand.

New Zealand farmers are well supported by telecommunications and connectivity, which is really exciting. Fonterra are continuing to develop smart apps for farmers, as we saw firsthand—for example, the ability to look at remote sensing in paddocks so that they can reduce inputs and increase productivity. The dairy cows are wearing Fitbits on their collars to provide information on oestrus so a farmer can take advantage of choosing the sex of calves.

New Zealand continue to develop smarter land and water-use strategies in agriculture to manage water quality and the challenges of intensification. But what was really impressive to the committee was the collaborative nature of academia, government research centres—similar to our GBEs here in Australia—and industry. This seems to put New Zealand in good stead to ensure farmers now and into the future are skilled, knowledgeable and adaptive to the transitions in technology and research.

The committee's previous inquiry into honey bee biosecurity enabled us to discuss further with New Zealand industry, in a visit to Arataki Honey in the Hawke's Bay region and its director Pam Flack, the role of management and the status of its industry some 17 years after the initial varroa incursion. We were informed that it's imperative that Australia have suitable chemicals registered for when varroa hits our shores. However, the mite is becomingly increasingly resistant to the chemicals being used. This is more the case in the US but will soon become the norm. While the number of New Zealand hives has increased since varroa, this is mainly due to the market demand and price of Manuka honey. However, the threat of myrtle rust on the source of this product means it is a precarious time for the industry and their economy in New Zealand.

Like the chair, I would also like to thank those who generously gave their time to committee members to assist us with our work and our extensive program. As the chair mentioned, Ms Ruth Lewis and Mr Winton Holmes from the New Zealand Office of the Clerk of the House of Representatives really made our visit truly memorable and gave us such a holistic view of the agriculture industry in New Zealand and one that we will treasure, I think, for many years to come. I would also like to thank the Australian High Commissioner, His Excellency Mr Peter Woolcott, as well as Anna Brown, Alison Duncan and of course the Right Honourable David Carter MP, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, for his frank discussions about New Zealand politics and the structure of their parliament and for his hospitality. Thank you very much.