New Zealand needed more courage and vision to help effect changes in many areas, including sustainable land management.
“It simply has been too long without any of that courage.
“By now we should be at the forefront of how our products are placed in the world markets and how we genuinely create a premium for those products.
“Until now this has all been left up to the industry with no leadership from the Minister of Primary Industries.”
He welcomed rumours Green Party leader James Shaw might even head up the Primary Industries Ministry but hoped pragmatism would win out over idealism when it came to helping the primary sector develop more sustainable practices.
“I worry that he may fixate upon organic farming but that will not deal with the issues we face right now and it will not help in getting farmers who own the land on board with any changes.”
Cookson believed the last inspiring minister the sector had was the unlikely figure of Jim Anderton.
“His roots were far from farming, coming from working class Christchurch, but he got good people around him and had a real belief in making agriculture better.”
On the whole the primary sector tended to do better under a Labour-led government.
“I think it is because they come in with no preconceptions about the industry and about what it should be.”
NZ had been shuffling and indecisive over big issues like managing greenhouse gases as the rest of the world got on with acting on its commitments.
“Right now we have all these disruptors coming down the line at us, especially around environmental issues.”
Meantime, countries like Ireland had pushed ahead with successful and authentic efforts to improve their sector’s sustainability and make it a marketing point of difference.
He was disappointed the government had left it to the primary industry to grapple with the issues, offering little vision and fewer goals on what needed to be achieved.
“DairyNZ is going a really good job but it’s on its own and government has left it to regional councils to enforce standards.
“Whoever comes in needs to re-establish trust and contact with regional councils and government departments like MPI.
“I am not afraid of this change in government. We badly need more inspirational leaders who are leading change.”
Reactions go from relaxed to hunkered down
Farmer reaction to the new coalition government has so far been muted and relaxed though at least one farmer is barricading himself in for a tough time.
“We are completely hunkered down – in defence mode with all non-essential expenditure and all capital development and plant replacement suspended until we know what new government policies will mean for us,” Mid Canterbury arable farmer David Clark said.
“Potentially the two biggest issues of concern come from (Winston) Peters saying he is going back to some old style of capitalism and the Labour Party’s industrial relations policies that were never challenged through the election campaign.
“I sincerely hope we are not going back to the 70s style union-dominated workplace,” Clark said.
“Obviously there will be a massive turning point for the New Zealand economy and I guess we will see what effect that is going to have as it unfolds.
“It is very concerning, the thought of renegotiating free-trade agreements and it remains to be seen what the changes in foreign investment will do to investment confidence in NZ.
“Peters was very clear he was not going to support water tax and I certainly expect him to follow that pledge.”
The worst thing about the election campaign was the huge amount of negativity about farming and the lack of acknowledgement of the huge amount of work being done in the agriculture sector to reduce environmental externalities.
“We can only wait and see what happens from here,” he said.
Irrigation New Zealand remained very strong in its belief a water tax was never going to improve water quality, chairwoman Nicky Hyslop said.
“And that is unlikely to happen now with Winston Peters making it very clear in his election campaign that he did not support water tax.
“And we will be holding him to that,” Hyslop said.
“It’s also pleasing to hear Jacinda Adern recognising that now,” she said.
Farmers and irrigators had a lot of common ground with all political parties in terms of improving water quality.
“As do all New Zealanders – we do want to continue to improve water quality and we want to continue to have input into shaping that policy, as we have been doing.”
Hyslop said a lot of the detail in Labour’s water policy was already being implemented.
“What we need to do a lot better is how we get that message out there.
“What we will be asking of the new government is for support to continue the initiatives and activities already occurring at catchment and farm level.”
Hyslop also wanted to see continued support for the National Policy Statement (NPS) on freshwater.
“There has been so much change in that space – let’s not undo a whole lot of work that’s already been done,” she said.
South Canterbury sheep farmer and Federated Farmers national meat and fibre chairman Miles Anderson said he was initially quite relaxed about the new government.
“I’m not too stressed at the moment – without detail around policy and specific ministers we don’t know what we may need to stress about,” he said.
“But in saying that I was quite surprised to hear Winston (Peters) in his speech, after his period of showmanship, say that the economy would take a hit – that is a concern,” Anderson said.
“But that’s not to suggest it’s all doom and gloom – yet.”
Anderson acknowledged that NZ First gained a lot of support from the provinces on its policies targeted at the rural sector.
“And we have got to have some confidence he will be a man of his word.”
“What will be interesting and what we are scant with detail on is the involvement of the Greens Party with Labour.”
