Building trust
OPINION: The war of words between Southland farmers and Environment Southland over winter grazing inspections reflects a deep lack of trust among farmers for the regional council.
Federated Farmers’ meat and wool section chair Miles Anderson told Rural News, at the recent Red Meat sector conference, of farmers’ problems in meeting the expectations of local and central government and meat companies.
It worries him that many farmers are quitting the industry because of this pressure.
“It adds a lot of psychological pressure on farmers and I fear that the smaller, family-type farm that’s been the backbone of NZ will find it harder to exist.”
Farmers face a variety of challenges – environmental change and climate change in particular. Anderson says he’d like to hear sound science on what is and what isn’t contributing to climate change.
“As for the environmental footprint of synthetic proteins being minor, I severely doubt this because of the intensive cropping needed to produce the precursors for the proteins; so you would have fertiliser use, chemical use and monoculture crops.
“With big areas you have biodiversity issues, water use and carbon in the soil, so I would like to see some evidential science on that as well.”
Consumer demand is also an issue. If the consumer is prepared to pay more for food verified as sustainably produced, farmers will do it, he says.
“But it’s doing stuff at cost for no return that I’m concerned about.”
He doubts NZ has done all it can to capture value in the marketplace and says the sector needs to work as a team to get the best returns.
“As country we are good at working in isolation and that needs to change,” Anderson says.
