Red meat exports slump, thanks to China
Weaker pricing and demand from China continue to impact New Zealand red meat export earnings.
A survey of ExportNZ members shows exporters are feeling anything but well about what the Government intends to deliver in 2019.
This is despite the empty rhetoric about the year of ‘delivery’ and ‘wellness’ coming from the Beehive lately.
Similarly, the Federated Farmers January Mid-Season Farm Confidence Survey shows the worst farmer confidence since 2009. In both cases, domestic regulation by the Government was the major concern. (Both surveys were run before China-NZ relations really started to head south).
As National’s agriculture spokesperson Nathan Guy says about soaring costs and taxes on farmers, there’s more to come, as confirmed by Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor when he told Rural News last year that farmers need to “get used to it”.
The ExportNZ survey zeroed in on industrial relations reforms. Over 400 exporters responded, described as “a good mix of small to medium to larger exporters”. When asked what their major barriers to exporting were, the number-one concern was “domestic regulation, e.g. upcoming changes to the industrial relations laws”.
Food and electronic equipment manufacturers said they already pay staff more than the minimum wage because good workers are hard to get. But all workers will want an increase “to maintain their relativity to the minimum wage” adding costs that, as exporters, they were unable to pass on to consumers.
Changes to immigration law could hobble growth in the horticulture sector, which is already desperately short of hands. A large commercial kiwifruit grower said, “We need the right immigration rules to support our industry because if we don’t have the people we can’t grow and our sector has big growth plans”.
The idea that locals could or would fill the labour gap just didn’t stack up. “We do work with WINZ, but out of 120 people sent to us by WINZ, we only gained four people over the course of a year.”
Creeping unionism is also identified by exporters as a concern, not just by manufacturers but also by large scale horticulture operators.
No government can deliver ‘wellness’, whatever that means, with growth in the economy already spluttering and diplomatic relations with our biggest customer, China, in trouble. The concerns of the people who drive our economy – exporters and farmers—should not be dismissed by the Government.
Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) director general Ray Smith says job cuts announced this morning will not impact the way the Ministry is organised or merge business units.
Scales Corporation is acquiring a number of orchard assets from Bostock Group.
Family and solidarity shone through at the 75 years of Ferdon sale in Otorohanga last month.
The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) has informed staff it will cut 391 jobs following a consultation period.
New Zealand farmers are committed to making their businesses more resilient to climate change and are embracing innovation to help them do so.
Atiamuri farmers Paul and Lesley Grey never gave up their dream of owning their own farm – and in 2020, that dream came true.
OPINION: This old mutt well remembers the wailing, whining and gnashing of teeth by former West Coast MP and Labour…
OPINION: Your canine crusader gets a little fed up with the some in media, union hacks, opposition politicians and hard-core…