The Government is fixing the Biosecurity Act and the National Animal Identification and Tracing (Nait) Act to ensure they meet future needs, Agriculture and Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor said.
Implementing the programme for Mycoplasma bovis exposed the clunkiness of the outdated Biosecurity Act and lessons must be learned from the M bovis experience to formulate a law that’s more flexible and appropriate.
And Nait was brought in with good intent but failed to deliver, O’Connor said.
But continuing to lumber farmers with more levies is not the answer, Lewis says.
“Farmers already pay $100 million in levies each year and these proposed changes will mean yet another levy.
“The M bovis levy has been firmed up, roughly $240m, a climate change levy will cost farmers $50m per year and a new biosecurity levy is being proposed. We also pay a Nait levy.”
Primary producers pay 32 different levies.
“The amount of levies we all cough up does sneak up.
“You pay them almost subconsciously without questioning the value as often as we should.
“In the last 10 years farmers have paid close to $1 billion – good value?
“What monumental shift in agriculture or value has this changed?” Lewis asked.
“I’m a supporter of levy bodies but that shouldn’t stop us questioning the value or direction of them.
“We need to ask the hard questions in what value are we getting.”
The M bovis levy will cost Lewis about $12,000 a year. On top of that he paid $17,000 in DairyNZ levies and levies to Beef + Lamb, the Foundation for Arable Research and to Nait.
“And there’s more – that’s just off the top of my head.”
He calculates DairyNZ takes in $66.2m a year, B+LNZ $24.4m and FAR $4.25m.
“That’s $94.9m with just those three.
“Farmers’ money is limited and must be used wisely.”
He slammed proposed changes to Nait that will cost farmers.
“It seems farmers always get the blame here but the Government needs to take more control and lessen the influence on industry bodies.
“And when they do these things and announce changes then present the why to farmers – why should always be the convincing factor but we just cop the cost and they always forget the why.”
Lewis doubts the powers that be actually realise how many different systems farmers have to work with.
“There’s over 30 different dairy databases in New Zealand that we could potentially register our cows on.
“At the end of the day there should be just one and farmers should own the information.
“If the Government wants this information for Nait the people in control should make it happen,” Lewis said.
“Yes, farmers take responsibility, farmers generally want to be law-abiding but we need laws and regulation and systems in place that make it reasonable and practical to achieve compliance.”
Dairy NZ is broadly supportive of the renewed focus on improving biosecurity but it is concerned about proposals for Nait data to be owned by the Crown.
“The initial Nait review did not include the Crown taking ownership of Nait data, which is farmer data, and we feel that process would need to be carefully managed,” Lewis said.
“Ownership of farmer data is something we want to be involved in so farmers’ concerns are fully addressed,” DairyNZ chief executive Tim Mackle said.
B+LNZ supports the Biosecurity Act review though it urges care be taken over proposed changes to farmers’ data in the Nait scheme.
“Any changes to the ownership and use of farmer data in Nait will need to be very carefully worked through and we look forward to the Government working closely with farmers to ensure these issues are addressed during the select committee process,” B+LNZ policy and advocacy general manager Dave Harrison said.
