Speech to Foundation for Arable Research Conference

Good morning ladies and gentlemen. I am delighted to be here.

Your conference theme, Beyond our Boundaries, suits the arable industry down to the ground. It encourages your farmers to strive for growth and embrace innovation, something that also fits well with the Government’s goal.

As the Parliamentary year gets underway the Prime Minister has taken the opportunity to outline the aspirations of this National-led Government.

We must grow the New Zealand economy in order to deliver greater prosperity, security and opportunity for all New Zealanders.

To do this we have set out four priorities that will help us rebuild and strengthen the country.

The first is to get the Government’s books back in order.

The Government is committed to returning to Budget surplus in 2014/15.

This is something we campaigned on and something we are determined to achieve.

It will involve delivering on our pre-election promise of the Mixed Ownership Model of four State Owned Enterprises, because we believe the capital released by these sales can be better utilised in other asset developments such as water storage – something I will comment on later.

Our second priority is to build a more competitive and productive economy.

Every sector has a responsibility to lift its game. There are no exceptions, and your arable sector has an important role to play.

Our third priority is to deliver better public services for families and businesses, within the tight budgets the Government is operating under. The public service spends your money. You deserve quality services that are delivered effectively and efficiently, using the latest available technology.

The unified and redesigned Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry is an example of the work we are doing to improve our public service.

With food safety and fisheries now under the MAF umbrella, the Ministry is strongly focussed on the success of the primary sectors, which over the last few years have demonstrated to us all that they are the very engine room of New Zealand's export economy.

The Government’s final priority is to get on with rebuilding Christchurch, our second largest city.

2011 was about dealing with the damage and destruction caused by the devastating earthquakes.

2012 must be about starting to rebuild a vibrant, strong city.

Christchurch presents a huge economic opportunity, with considerable overseas capital about to flow courtesy of the international insurance market.

But it will require a strongly performing hinterland. With Canterbury such a major agricultural province, the wealth flowing from the surrounding rural areas back into the city will be a major economic catalyst during this rebuild.

The timing couldn’t be better. We’re entering an era of primary sector buoyancy.

2011 was a bumper year for most farmers. It is certainly the best that I have seen in my 35 year plus farming career.

Farmer confidence is high as our industry continues to reduce debt and undertake some of the overdue maintenance on our farms.

Your arable sector, and maize growers in particular look set to benefit from dairy growth in recent years, and its strong outlook.

Our dairy industry is huge. It’s New Zealand’s biggest export earner accounting for around 30 percent of our export revenue.

New Zealand dairy exports account for around a third of all international dairy trade.

In my opinion there is potential for the arable and dairy industries to work better together.

I’d like to congratulate the Foundation of Arable Research and DairyNZ for their work in exploring the benefits of arable crop rotations in dairy systems to control nutrient leaching.

I also applaud FAR for its support of the Arable Industry Marketing initiative. This initiative aims to ensure future sustainability and improve competitiveness for the industry.

Looking ahead there are two areas that I think the primary sector and the arable industry in particular, need to pay particular attention to.

They are two areas that I have detailed to the Prime Minister as top priorities within my portfolio.

The first is irrigation and water storage.

Water is possibly our biggest opportunity to grow our economy.

It is New Zealand’s liquid gold.

We have plenty of it, but not always in the right place and at the right time.

This Government’s provision of $400 million from the Future Investment Fund to support the construction of well-designed irrigation schemes, along with the $35 million Irrigation Acceleration Fund, have huge potential to unlock long term prosperity for our primary sectors.

This is something that needs to be done sooner rather than later. By doing it right the first time round we will reap the rewards of these irrigation schemes for at least the next 100 years.

The recent announcement of the first project for the Irrigation Acceleration Fund (IAF) was the Ruataniwha Project in the Hawke’s Bay region.

This proposal stands to unlock enormous potential in the region, with the amount of irrigable land likely to increase from 6000ha to around 22,000ha.

I want to see more areas of New Zealand reliably irrigated and I’m pleased that discussions are taking place with promoters of schemes in the Wairarapa, Marlborough, Canterbury and Otago.

It is important that we get this work underway now when we have a Government that recognises the importance of these projects.

My second priority is biosecurity.

We are an island nation but with increasing tourism and trade there’ll always be risk.

It is important that the Government continues to work closely with industry to ensure our biosecurity system works more efficiently.

The Government is making good progress with its work on Government Industry Agreements or GIAs.

GIAs are about Government and industry working together to prepare for and respond to any possible biosecurity risk.

I encourage the arable sector to get involved. The GIAs present an opportunity for industries to have a say in how we prepare for and respond to unwanted pests and diseases that directly impact on their business.

One tool that was launched last year to support New Zealand’s disease readiness and response programmes is the FarmsOnLine database.

The database holds property location, ownership and land use information so that the Government can rapidly respond in the event of a biosecurity emergency or natural disaster.

Having this type of information and being able to contact farmers quickly in these situations helps protect crops, stock and growers livelihoods, and the New Zealand economy.

It also gives our trading partners confidence in our ability to respond to disease outbreaks.

For those of you also involved in livestock farming, I’m pleased to say that we are seeing good progress with the National Animal Identification and Tracing Scheme or NAIT. Parliament looks set to finally pass the legislation this evening.

NAIT will give assurances around traceability to our consumers and will also better position us to respond to a possible disease incursion.

To conclude, the world financial markets remain at risk. The USA, the world’s largest economy looks set for many years of subdued performance.

The EU, the world’s largest economic trading bloc, faces a threat of implosion as it decides how to deal with countries like Greece and Italy.

Whilst New Zealand is not immune, these markets are still very important to us, we are lucky to have repositioned ourselves so significantly to Asia, and in particular China.

But our real saviour is New Zealand’s reliance on primary production.

We produce some of the best food in the world, at a time when food security is the world’s greatest challenge.

There will continue to be challenges ahead.

The Government will continue working hard to create a field of play where your industry can, and will succeed. But you must play your part too.

It will be teamwork between industry and Government that will deliver the best economic growth this country needs.

Thank you again for inviting me to speak to you this morning – and enjoy the rest of your conference.