OSPRI writes off $17m over botched traceability system
Animal disease management agency OSPRI has written off nearly $17 million after a botched attempt to launch a new integrated animal disease management and traceability system.
The deer sector has joined a growing chorus of farming groups – and others – describing the Government’s targets for methane reductions as unrealistic.
Deer Industry New Zealand says it is disappointed by the announced emissions reduction targets for agriculture.
Dr Ian Walker, chair of Deer Industry NZ (DINZ), says that under current conditions these targets will only result in significant reductions in stock numbers.
“Even if tools and technologies were available to reduce methane and nitrous oxide in the future, the level of reduction would effectively mean that the agriculture sector was being asked not just to cease its own contribution to global warming, but also offset the contribution of other sectors.”
Walker says the deer industry, as part of the pastoral sector, is prepared to play its part in climate change mitigation.
“We do not deny human-induced climate change nor our responsibility to mitigate. The pastoral sector is willing to target net zero global warming impact from agricultural gasses. But the targets for methane announced by the Government go beyond net zero global warming impact. DINZ cannot support these targets,” he says.
“The rationale for methane to be reduced by between 24 and 47% by 2050 has not been made clear to us.
“We can only assume that the Government expects agriculture to make ‘headroom’ for other sectors to continue emitting.”
Walker says this is unfair for the sector, but also a bad choice for NZ because in the absence of new mitigation technology a 47% reduction in agricultural methane emissions will require a 47% reduction in pastoral farming outputs.
“This could reduce rural employment and export revenues from meat, milk and fibre by half, or about $12 billion a year,” he says.
“The Government has expressed no plan for how this employment and export revenue could be replaced and NZers’ living standards maintained.”
Walker says reducing agricultural methane emissions is only a temporary solution.
It buys time but does not address the fundamental cause of climate change, which is the release of fossil carbon into the atmosphere.
“The deer industry alongside other pastoral industries supports the pastoral sector reducing nitrous oxide to net zero and gradually reducing and stabilising emissions of methane so that its levels in the atmosphere do not increase (i.e. no additional warming effect from livestock agriculture).
“The pastoral sector including DINZ will continue to support research on agricultural greenhouse gas mitigation options and development of a robust framework to enable farms to transition to lower emissions. But DINZ considers there is little sense in sacrificing NZ’s economic backbone.”
Foot and Mouth Disease outbreaks could have a detrimental impact on any country's rural sector, as seen in the United Kingdom's 2000 outbreak that saw the compulsory slaughter of over six million animals.
The Ministry for the Environment is joining as a national award sponsor in the Ballance Farm Environment Awards (BFEA from next year).
Kiwis are wasting less of their food than they were two years ago, and this has been enough to push New Zealand’s total household food waste bill lower, the 2025 Rabobank KiwiHarvest Food Waste survey has found.
OPINION: Sir Lockwood Smith has clearly and succinctly defined what academic freedom is all about, the boundaries around it and the responsibility that goes with this privilege.
DairyNZ says its plantain programme continues to deliver promising results, with new data confirming that modest levels of plantain in pastures reduce nitrogen leaching, offering farmers a practical, science-backed tool to meet environmental goals.
'Common sense' cuts to government red tape will make it easier for New Zealand to deliver safe food to more markets.