New Zealand Horticulture Export AuthorityAmendment Bill (No 2)

I move, That the New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a third time. The Horticulture Export Authority was established in 1987, under the New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Act, to promote the effective export marketing of horticultural products. It has achieved that, very effectively. In the last financial year around $125 million of horticultural products were exported under the Act. Squash, avocados, and summer fruit were the major contributors to that $125 million of exports.

The bill we are dealing with was introduced into the House in March 2003. It went to the Primary Production Committee for consideration, where a large number of submissions were heard. The bill has three objectives, as stated. The first was to enable the export of kiwifruit for consumption in Australia to be facilitated under the Act. Because the export of kiwifruit comes under the Kiwifruit Export Regulations 1999, there was a requirement to adjust the New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Act to enable the Horticulture Export Authority to regulate the collaborative marketing of kiwifruit into Australia. The submissions from the kiwifruit industry demonstrated a clear mandate to the Primary Production Committee for amendment to this Act.

The second aim of the bill was to ensure consistency with New Zealand’s international obligations. It was achieved through the bill by preventing export marketing strategies from imposing quantitative restrictions on exports under the Act. The committee improved the clarity of the bill in that respect, through proposing amendments that have now been incorporated into the bill. The first of the amendments was the insertion of the words “market development” into the bill, to ensure that an export marketing strategy, while not imposing quantitative restrictions on the Act, would indeed allow sensible consideration of market developments and long-term market access.

The third aim of the bill was to improve the administrative provisions in the Act by applying hearings and appeal provisions to the licensing decisions of the Horticulture Export Authority. There is also now an ability in the bill to allow the Horticulture Export Authority to cancel redundant export licences. That will assist the authority in keeping an up-to-date roll on those who are exporting.

Finally, I would like to thank the Primary Production Committee, under the chair of David Carter. It has done an excellent job in making some minor amendments to the bill. That was necessary, and it will certainly ensure that we get good, solid, and consistent value—the best value we can—from the Australian market, which does not undermine exporters’ efforts in that area. I commend the bill to the House.

National supports, with pleasure, the third reading of this bill. Initially, I want to make two points. First, I want to acknowledge in this third reading the tremendous turn-round that has occurred within the kiwifruit industry of New Zealand, and I congratulate Zespri and the growers on the progress that has been made. It was not many years ago that we perceived that industry to be an industry on its knees, and now it is enjoying record returns. So Zespri, as an organisation, with the support of growers has done tremendously well over those intervening years.

The second group that I want to take note of today is the Horticulture Export Authority itself. The authority has been a very successful mechanism that allows the control of horticultural products under a framework. This results in the betterment of those products that are now included within the product groups under the Horticulture Export Authority. Products like buttercup squash, table grapes, chestnuts, persimmons, avocados, tamarillos, boysenberries, and Nashi Asian pears, just demonstrate the wide diversity of horticultural exports from New Zealand to overseas markets. The producers of these individual products would, if left to their own resources, find it difficult to get a cooperative marketing approach to the world, but this mechanism provides a highly successful means of New Zealand having the ability to market its product in an orderly fashion to present top quality produce to markets around the world. So I pay credit to them.

The reasoning behind the amendment to the Act has been well explained through the second reading and the Committee stage, and I do not intend to go over it again now. Suffice it to say that the Australian market was initially tried as a domestic market. That meant that the returns from the Australian market were not being maximised to the benefit of New Zealand growers. There was also the side issue—but an important side issue—reported to the select committee of some New Zealand product going through Australia, then being re-exported to other nations to the detriment of the efforts of Zespri in those particular countries. I think that was a valid concern. It was a loophole that needed to be closed down, and therefore National is happy to support that.

I conclude by thanking my colleagues on the select committee. We have had a very significant workload this year with another matter that we hope to bring to fruition in approximately 4 or 5 weeks’ time. In between the hearings we have had on that other substantial matter, we have managed to facilitate the legislation through the select committee process. With the amendments we have made through that process, the bill is now back before the House in a very commendable shape.

I nearly fell over a wee while ago—not as a result of the gin—when I heard my colleague Gerrard Eckhoff speak about the tyranny of the majority. That was a bit unusual, coming from him.

Every producer, every business person, and every marketer has the right, the opportunity, the privilege, and, I believe, the obligation to maximise the returns of its products to the benefit of its growers. If that industry, market, group of farmers, or horticulturalists can do that, then I say: “All strength to their elbow.” They are marketing in niche markets for the benefit of New Zealand and conducting market development, which is very costly. I believe that this bill will reward them for that and help them to get the better returns they seek.

We cannot let this bill pass without mentioning the competition. I read in trade magazines just the other day that the Chinese—from whence kiwifruit came; it was originally the Chinese gooseberry—are getting into the market in a big way themselves. They are formidable opponents in this area. They have thousands of years of culture behind them. They have been involved in agriculture for thousands of years, and they are not to be taken lightly.

This industry of ours, which is still a very, very small industry by world standards, needs all the help it can get. It needs the reputation that has been built up, it needs all the authority the Government can give it to make sure that its markets are not invaded by inferior quality fruit, and, at the same time, it needs to be very quick on its feet to move and develop new products—and it can still do that. In other words, the industry needs to keep on its mettle, and I am sure it will. I am sure this bill will help it.

If we were to go out in a naive fashion, we would have individual farmers—or individual traders even—in the most ridiculous scenario, trying to sell their produce to huge supermarket conglomerates, which is where the buying power is held nowadays. It is not just a matter of going and selling on a fair market. We are selling on markets where every objection will be put up. They will put up every tariff.

They will put up any blockage possible in other countries to either stop or make it harder for our exports to enter their market, and chief among them are the huge supermarket conglomerates. They will use their power to lower the price to our exporters, and therefore lower the prices received in New Zealand. We rely on those prices for our standard of living. This bill will do what it can to stop that practice from happening, and New Zealand First is all for it.

Despite what some might think in listening to this debate, this bill is one of the more important measures that we have around this House. It is very important because it affects the wealth of this country, and it affects those who create and export that wealth and add to our overall prosperity.

In listening to previous speeches, I could not help but wonder—as I listened with my extra-sensitive perceptive ears, although I am rather deaf—just how long ago it was that we sat listening to speeches, some that Mr Speaker might well have heard, that lauded the formation of the Dairy Board, the Meat Board, and, indeed, the ENZA Board. All these boards became single-desk authoritative bodies that we are now debating at this time. We also remember that, although at the time they sounded like a very, very good idea, they have now passed into history. So time will tell whether I am right or wrong. I suspect that in time—perhaps 10 years; I do not know when—we will be back here wondering why we passed this particular bill.

That aside, I have absolute pride in speaking to this bill because the philosophy behind it is hugely important. Indeed, the principle behind it is of equal importance. It is about the right of people to export their own product—it is not difficult; it is quite simple—and it is about innovation. It is about the right of indigenous people, as I have mentioned in previous speeches, to sell their product without input from overwhelming cost structures, which inevitably—

R Doug Woolerton: Which ones are you talking about?

We have one or two still, I believe, in the North Island—but we will not go there.

The fundamental basis behind that philosophy of ensuring that people have the right to sell their product if they create it, is a hugely important one. That is why I will vote against this bill, out of principle, not so much out of the practice, or what is going to happen over the next few years. I am sure things will go along quite nicely in the interim, but long term I suspect we will be back here again, wondering why we passed this bill.

I also reflect on the fact that the wine industry has become hugely more regulated. The regulations were three or maybe four pages long as I recall, but now they are 100 pages. We have had concerns from the World Trade Organization about the near monopoly that Fonterra operates. In this global village of ours these are very genuine and real concerns that this House should be concerned about. Our trade Ministers of all Governments, present and past, go overseas exhorting the rest of the world to get rid of controls and regulations, and unless we do something very similar we really cannot stand at the top of the mountain and say: “We’ve done it, follow us.” We are still looking for this measure of protection. If the rest of the world sees that we are not pulling our weight or we are a little less than pure as the driven snow, as we pretend we are, then I suspect we will have some trouble convincing countries like America and Europe that they should do away with regulation and allow the trade of the world to interact with one another. It will find its natural balance, as indeed the kiwifruit industry will, under the same basis.

It is with some ambivalence—I think that is the right word—that this bill will pass, as far as I am concerned. I respect the rights of kiwifruit growers to form themselves into a bloc if that is what they wish, but I wish also that other people would respect the rights of individuals—and this is what is so important—to do their own thing throughout the world, if they so choose. It is very foolish people who go out there and undercut their neighbours, because ultimately they will undercut themselves, and that adds nothing.

I understand why people are very much in favour of some sort of export authority. However, I come back to the philosophy and the principle. It makes me feel rather sad that we have come to this situation, but I do have to respect the rights of kiwifruit growers to form themselves into a grouping. That is their right and their privilege.

Bill read a third time.

The House adjourned at 5.14 p.m. (Thursday)