Killing season off to a slow start
Variable weather conditions across the country are being blamed for the slow start to the meat processing season.
Canada's blatant manipulation of international trade rules around the export of subsidised dairy products is likely to escalate further with the new Trump administration now in the White House.
Just a week ago the Dairy Companies Association of NZ (DCANZ) joined forces with similar organisations in the US and Australia in writing to their respective agriculture ministers over Canada's dumping of subsidised dairy products on the world market. The move is distorting the market and affecting dairy farmers' returns in other dairy exporting countries such as NZ.
NZ's Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says his government shares their concerns and says he's previously raised objections with Canada. He says he's now instructed his trade officials to engage with their counterparts in Australia and the USA on Canada's practices and asked for an assessment of any harm that is being caused in international markets.
"We will be exploring what action we might take jointly, in particular with the new administration in the US, against harmful Canadian dairy trade practices," he told Rural News.
This issue, according to DCANZ executive director Kimberly Crewther, is different and bigger than the other beef NZ has with Canada which is blocking NZ exports to Canada under and existing agreement through the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Under CPTPP rules, Canada is required to give NZ access to its market and despite NZ winning a mediation dispute to have access, Canada blatantly refused to budge. This dispute has been going on for almost two years and has been the subject of several mediations, all of which have been won by NZ but which Canada has refused to comply with.
McClay says NZ will continue to peruse legal action under the CPTPP and, with the impending change of prime minister in Canada, will take the opportunity to urge the new administration to address our concerns and stop these harmful dairy practices.
The Issue
At the heart of this latest action by Canada is the lengths their government is going to curry favour with their lifestyle-like domestic dairy industry – average herd size a mere 89 cows. And it’s not the first time the Canadians have done this, effectively dumping heavily subsidised milk powder on the international market to the detriment of unsubsidised NZ producers.
According to DCANZ’s Kimberly Crewther, what the Canadian Dairy Commission, a government enacted organisation, is doing is setting up an internal system that manipulates the price downwards so that dairy producing companies can buy milk from farmers at cut prices, enabling them to undercut other international exporters.
“The price that the processors can buy the milk from farmers is roughly half the cost of producing that milk. This means that Canadian milk products that would otherwise be uncompetitive are out there competing against us,” she says.
New US president Donald Trump has signalled that he will apply tariffs on Canada. But aside of that rhetoric, there lurks an agreement called the ‘United States- Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA)’ – effectively a free trade agreement between the three countries – which is coming up for renegotiation. Previously this agreement had a clause preventing this sort of action by Canada, but to get around this, the Canadians simply changed the type of milk in the agreement from class 7 to class A4 and went back to its policy of subsidies again.
It’s possible that the present row involving the US, Australia and NZ could become part of this process as well.
If a New Zealand wool carpet maker were to win the bid for the hotly debated Kainga Ora state housing contract, the benefits to New Zealand would be “far reaching”.
For the first time in 17 years, DairyNZ wants farmers to contribute more cash to run the industry-good organisation.
The Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) is bolstering its frontline applications teams in a bid to reduce the timeframe for new product applications, but agri chemical producers say that it isn't good enough.
New Zealand’s apple and pear industry has surpassed $1 billion in orchard gate returns (OGR) for the first time.
With less than a week to go before submissions close on the Government’s controversial Gene Technology Bill, two agribusiness executives - John Greenberg and Michael Henne - are calling on Fonterra to demand an extension to the submission period.
Just on two years ago Cyclone Gabrielle wreaked havoc in Hawke's Bay causing massive damage to NZ's largest apple growing region.
OPINION: We are told there is a wine glut - production outstripping demand worldwide - and the words 'wine lakes'…
OPINION: Science funding for the bulwark of the nation, agriculture, is in a parlous state and less taxpayer money is…