Latest news with #FederatedFarmers
RNZ News
a day ago
- Business
- RNZ News
Commerce Commission dismisses Federated Farmers complaint on net-zero banking
ANZ, ASB, BNZ, Westpac, and Rabobank are all signatories to the Net-Zero Banking Alliance. Photo: RNZ The Commerce Commission has dismissed a Federated Farmers complaint that five major local banks acted like a cartel, tying lending to climate targets. ANZ, ASB, BNZ, Westpac, and Rabobank are all signatories to the Net-Zero Banking Alliance, which aligns lending policies to climate change goals. Together, the five banks account for 97 percent of agricultural lending in New Zealand. The Commission's general manager competition Vanessa Horne said no evidence of anti-competitive or cartel-like behaviour had been found. "We thoroughly investigated the complaint and concluded that the banks had made their own, independent decisions. "We found no evidence of unlawful co-ordination between the banks or with the Net-Zero Banking Alliance, either relating to the banks joining or in meeting their obligations under this alliance." Federated Farmers alleged the five banks were co-ordinating their agricultural lending with Net-Zero Banking Alliance strategies which could violate the Commerce Act. It also alleged that this could make it harder for farmers to get loans and increase borrowing costs. Its banking spokesperson Mark Hooper called the Commission's decision disappointing but accepted it. "The reason we made the submission in the first place was that we felt there had been some collusion and there was a sort of collective agreement that would have limited farmers' choice. So in that sense we're disappointed, but we still think it was the right course of action to go down." Hooper said they remained concerned that banks were straying from their "core role of lending money based on real risk considerations and not indulging in the climate change space". The Net-Zero Banking Alliance is a United Nations (UN) initiative that guides banks to lead on climate mitigation in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement. Its website claims 127 banks worldwide have signed up, overseeing $74 trillion in total assets. In background information the Commission said the Alliance did not prescribe targets for signatories, gave a framework for target setting, and tools to assess the emissions within their portfolios and how to speed up lending towards low-carbon activity. Rural concerns about the reduction of lending to rural based petrol stations , prompted New Zealand First MP Andy Foster to pursue a private members' bill to prevent banks from refusing to lend for so-called "woke ideology" reasons. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
NZ Herald
4 days ago
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Farm-to-forest limits set to protect rural land, Federated Farmers voice support
Schroder said the Rotorua-Taupō region, among others, had a mix of high-performing sheep and beef farms and marginal land, making it attractive for forestry investment. 'While forestry has a useful place in our primary sector, the rapid conversion of entire farms has raised concerns amongst the community about rural depopulation, loss of food production and the erosion of local community infrastructure,' he said. 'The proposed legislation goes some way to getting the balance right.' The Government planting proposal is chiefly based on land-use capability (LUC), ranging from one (highest) to eight. Legislation would restrict conversions to exotic ETS forests on high to medium-versatility farmland (LUC classes 1-6) and introduce a limit of 15,000ha per year for exotic conversions on medium-versatility farmland (class 6). The annual limit will be allocated by a ballot process, while allowing for up to 25% of a farm's LUC 1-6 land to still be planted in exotic forestry for the ETS. Land protection Schroder said capping ETS eligibility on LUC 6 land and excluding LUC 1-5 from conversion helped protect the most productive land. 'Allowing up to 25% of a farm to be planted in exotic forestry means landowners still have the flexibility and choice to diversify and manage erosion-prone areas. 'However, the 15,000ha annual cap may still allow significant change, and the ballot system could create uncertainty for landowners.' Schroder said if the ETS made a clearer distinction between long-term carbon storage and forestry plantations for harvest, it might be easier to balance environmental goals with the needs of rural areas. Federated Farmers acknowledged the value in maintaining flexibility for landowners, he said. 'This legislation doesn't oppose forestry; it supports more strategic long-term thinking about how we use our land. 'The challenge is protecting the future of rural communities while still allowing room for diversification when it makes sense. 'This legislation is a more balanced approach and is a positive step forward for rural communities.' Long-time forestry consultant Jeff Tombleson said the proposed legislation had been signalled before the last election and 'imposes little surprise' on the industry. Since the 1990s, he said farm forestry had not occurred on any scale. 'It almost ceased. Land prices became prohibitive.' Based in Rotorua, he said the current harvest of the 1990s plantings was 75% complete. The land involved has largely been replanted, along with a second planting 'spike' of up to 300,000ha of new forests on sheep and beef country from 2018-2025. With relatively high returns for carbon, Tombleson predicted this 'spike' would have continued if restrictions were not introduced. He said the largest areas of new forests in New Zealand were in Auckland/Northland, Southland and the Central Plateau (Rotorua/Taupō). The Government bill proposes a start date of October 31. 'We will process applications to register in the ETS under the current rules until the restrictions come into effect,' McClay said at Fieldays.
RNZ News
5 days ago
- Business
- RNZ News
Supermarkets aren't moving fast enough to lower dairy prices, says Federated Farmers dairy chair
File photo. Photo: Supermarkets aren't moving fast enough to lower the price on dairy products for consumers when there is a drop in cost, says the Federated Farms dairy chair. Latest figures out on Thursday had food prices shooting up 4.6 percent from last year. The price of a block of butter is now 120 percent higher than it was 10 years ago, and increases in dairy prices in general helped pull up food prices in June, Stats NZ said. Milk was up 14.3 percent for the year, to $4.57 for two litres, butter was up 46.5 percent to $8.60 for a 500g block, and cheese was up 30 percent to $13.04 for a 1kg block. Federated Farmers dairy chair Karl Dean said while the market always fluctuated, supermarkets could move quicker to lower their prices when costs do go down. "Most farms have to buy butter themselves, they can't make it on the farm, we feel the pain as well," he told Morning Report. "The big thing is prices do fluctuate all the time but when the prices drop back down, how quickly are those passed on to consumers? "We've all seen it before ... it seems to take a very long time for dairy products in the supermarket to drop in price, where it should, in my view, be a little bit faster, if those companies can wrangle some deals with suppliers." Dean said export prices continue to drive the cost of dairy, as well as the wholefoods trend, which was a direct correlation. "The one that consumers aren't going to want to hear is because they've heard it so much already is the global exporting prices is at an all-time high," he said. "It does seem to be that the global demand for butter at the moment just seems to be a new trend and global production hasn't ramped up as a result yet." The commodity price for butter is double what it was 10 years ago, he said. He said as a result, farmers are at a record-farm gate milk price this year, which has largely been led by the likes of butter and cheese. But the main export of New Zealand, whole milk powders and skim milk powders, were not at a record-high level, he said. "We actually have a very different pricing mix to what we've seen a decade ago," he said. Finance Minister Nicola Willis recently asked for a please explain from Fonterra - which pinned the pricing on global prices. But Dean said there is not much Fonterra could do. "There is probably very little Fonterra can do, they are obviously looking at selling their consumer brand business of Australasia and that'll mean there is no longer any form of control in that local market," he said. "To put in it in perspective, there hasn't been any new players onto the domestic market in the last 10 years in terms of butter, other than the likes of Westgold - Westland have got their very premium product. "But there are another one or two manufacturers of butter in New Zealand and they don't supply to the domestic market at all, so that doesn't help competition." Many Morning Report listeners have expressed their thoughts on the topic; here's just a few messages sent in. "Butter price: anyone still wasting money buying food and beverages from cafés is, by definition, not suffering from dairy prices. Plenty of disposable income around apparently." - David, Dunedin "Why is petrol so cheap in oil producing countries? Would the same logic not apply to butter in NZ?" - Owen "When butter was at $6 a block in the supermarket, the supermarkets were earning approx. $3 per block. At $11 per block, the supermarkets are taking $5.50! The supermarkets applying a straight % mark-up is part of the problem and the lack of supermarket competition is a large part of the issue." - Name withheld "The cost to get butter to market on the other side of the world must be significantly higher than getting it to stores in NZ. Why is that not reflected in the NZ price?" - Name withheld "Went dairy-free over five years ago so don't know what the cost issue is all about. However, the biggest issue with dairy prices increasing is less dairy eaten in NZ and more pollution from the dairy industry in NZ." - Name withheld "I've definitely cut back on butter and cheese use. I also take home any remaining butter from café scones. Perfect for my toast."- Sandra, Porirua "Why is it that NZ butter and cheese is so much cheaper in Australia?" - Jacqui "Contrary to popular belief it's possible to eat well without dairy." - Name withheld Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
6 days ago
- Politics
- RNZ News
Emissions Trading Scheme incentivising whole farm conversions into forestry, farmers say
Pine forestry harvesting in Waimata Valley near Gisborne. Photo: RNZ / Alexa Cook Federated Farmers is urging the government to listen to its submission on legislation that looks to prevent whole-farm conversions into forestry. The Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Scheme-Forestry Conversion) Amendment Bill had its first reading in June and a number of submissions were heard in a parliamentary select committee on Tuesday. Federated Farmers Forestry spokesperson Richard Dawkins told RNZ the future of rural communities was at stake if the government did not take this opportunity to make serious changes to the ETS. "The logic is clear. We just can't continue to undermine our productive sector or we're never gonna get ahead as a country," he said. Dawkins said Federated Farmers had no issue with forestry, but with the current ETS settings. "There's no problem with the right tree in the right place. "We encourage that, but with the way the ETS settings are at the moment, you're just incentivising whole farm conversions into permanent exotics and that, it's just no good, no good for anyone," he said. Gisborne farmer and former Federated Farmers forestry spokesperson Toby Williams told RNZ the campaign was launched out of widespread concern for the increase in productive farm land being planted in pine trees. "We're really concerned that the continuing government policy looks to drive down the available land for sheep production. "We already know that our meat processors are struggling and we want to ensure that we actually have an industry still that can play its part in thriving rural communities, but also a thriving New Zealand and driving our export returns," he said. Federated Farmers have put up a billboard in Wellington claiming "sheep are not the problem". Photo: Supplied The Ministry for Primary Industries had a goal of doubling primary sector exports by 2035, but Williams said the sheep flock was declining. "Shrinking the sheep flock and shrinking the area that we farm sheep on isn't a great way to drive that forward," he said. Federated Farmers wants the government's review of the ETS to make two key changes - reducing the amount of emissions that large polluters can offset with trees, and capping the number of pine tree credits entered into the ETS. "We'd like to see a sinking lid on how many offsets a polluter could do every year. For example, we'd say in 2025 this year you could do 100 percent, but next year it drops to 95 into 9085 and so on," he said. The farming group was also keen to cap how many pine tree credits a polluter could enter into the ETS. "That will also have the same effect of slowing conversions of sheep and beef land into pine trees just for carbon offsets, and it will bring some actual balance," he said. Williams said if nothing changed with the ETS, then in 25 years time about 750,000 hectares of sheep producing land would be turned into pine trees. Gisborne farmer and former Federated Farmers forestry spokesperson Toby Williams. Photo: RNZ / Jimmy Ellingham Forestry Owners Association chief executive Elizabeth Heeg told RNZ it was not impressed with the Federated Farmers campaign targeting forestry. "We are disappointed that trees, and particularly pine trees, are being singled out as being the primary cause of some kind of a decline in the sheep numbers where actually we are not the correlation or the cause of the decline in sheep numbers. "Sheep numbers have been declining over the past 20 years and the forestry area has just started to come back in the last few years. So we are actually at a position at the national level of the same amount of forestry land area that we had 20 years ago," she said. While Heeg agrees that land use had changed over the past 20 years, she said it was more complicated than blaming it on forestry. "We're not seeing some kind of exponential growth in forestry planting. Actually, we did have an increase in forestry planting in the last couple of years, but we're seeing that largely kind of plateau at this stage," said Heeg. The group was alarmed by Federated Farmers idea of a 'sinking lid' policy on how many trees a polluter could plant to offset its emissions. "We would be deeply concerned if the government looked to take forestry out of the emissions trading scheme, because trees are still the only proven mitigation technology that we have. "I find it interesting that farmers would be asking for that when it's one of the chief ways that they could mitigate their climate emissions. So the inclusion or not of trees in the Emissions Trading Scheme, I feel like that horse has already bolted," said Heeg. The Forestry Owners Association says forestry is not the problem. Photo: RNZ / Alexa Cook The association was strongly against phasing forestry out of the ETS, instead urging more action from polluters . "I think it's nuts that we would get rid of our only proven mitigation tool rather than look at achieving gross emissions reductions. "It's a little bananas that when the rural sector needs as much support as possible, that we've got people pitting elements of the sector against itself when actually a lot of farmers are foresters as well and they're happily doing both in the landscape," she said. However, Federated Farmers said its members were definitely not happy - and wanted to see more action from the government. "We want to see an urgent review of the ETS as the government has held off doing it. There have been tweaks over the years, but that's it. "We're not the only organisation calling for changes to how we're doing this because of the threat to our economy," said Toby Williams. Minister for Forestry Todd McClay said the Federated Farmers' Save Our Sheep campaign highlighted exactly why his government was taking action to stop the wholesale loss of productive farmland to pine trees. "Under the last government, sheep and beef farms across regions like Hawke's Bay were bought out by carbon speculators, driven by careless and unbalanced ETS settings. Labour made it more profitable to plant pine trees than to farm sheep - and rural communities paid the price," said McClay. Minister for Forestry Todd McClay. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver However, Labour Party forestry spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel said this was not a matter of sheep and beef farming versus forestry. "It's a matter of striking the right balance between industry growth and environmental protection. Labour has always believed the right tree should be planted in the right place - anything to the contrary is scaremongering. "This government has taken nearly two years to do anything about this. Labour were the ones with policy that put decision-making back into local hands on farm to forestry conversions and we are committed to finding long-term, locally-led, sustainable solutions," she said. Todd McClay said his government was moving forward on the issue. "On 4 December last year, we announced a ban on full farm-to-forest conversions, and legislation will be passed by October this year and backdated to that announcement - stopping blanket ETS planting on productive farmland and giving sheep and beef farmers a fair go," he said. However, McClay said the ETS was not the only challenge the sheep sector faced, as the wool industry had struggled - which is why he was supporting the sector by using wool in government buildings and housing, and investing in new uses through public-private partnerships. "We're not anti-forestry, but it can't come at the expense of highly-quality, safe and sustainable food production. We're levelling the playing field and backing farmers to grow the best lamb and mutton in the world - and sell it to the world," said McClay. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
6 days ago
- Climate
- RNZ News
Government launches $500k support package for flood-hit farmers in Tasman
Minister Todd McClay on the Parkes Eighty Eight Valley Farm. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ The government has announced a half-million-dollar support package for [ flood-hit farmers, growers and foresters, with Tasman's mayor warning the total repair bill from the back-to-back floods is likely to exceed $100 million. Minister of Agriculture and Forestry Todd McClay visited forestry representatives, farmers and growers across the battered district on Tuesday, after announcing another $300,000 for the mayoral relief fund tagged to the rural sector, with it also matching $50,000 contributions from Horticulture New Zealand and Federated Farmers for the horticulture and pastoral sectors respectively. The funding comes as the district-wide clean up continues - alongside a warning more heavy rain is expected in the weeks ahead. McClay said about 200 landowners had come forward looking for support so far but the number of farms and orchards affected would be greater than that, as assessments by Ministry of Primary Industries staff continued. A bridge over the Quail Valley Stream that was overtopped in the June flood. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ He said there would be a range of effects, from areas where there was localised and moderate damage to other areas "where some farms won't be able to go back into production any time soon if at all". Eighty Eight Valley farmer Ian Parkes estimated the damage to his property alone would cost around $200,000. Both the Eighty Eight Valley stream and Quail Valley stream run through the Parkes' farm, with around 13 kilometres of land bordering both waterways. "Every flood gate has gone, we have 25 and they have all are certain areas of the farm there is no stock movement and the problem with no stock movement is we lose our feed, we can't control it." Around 60 tonnes of rock was put in parts of the river to protect farm sheds and a bridge over the Quail Valley stream, but at least half of it was washed away in the floods. During the first deluge, the rising water overtopped the bridge and left Parkes stuck on one side for several hours with his wife on the other, only able to cross once the waters had receded. Eighty Eight Valley farmer Ian Parkes. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ A fifth-generation farmer in the valley, Parkes said it was the worst flood he'd seen, causing more damage than the last big flood in 1983. When it began raining again last Friday, he called it a day much earlier than he usually would. "I just thought, bugger, I just had a shower, went to bed because I was buggered... you couldn't take any more." He's made the decision to slaughter and sell some stock, anticipating feed pressure in the coming months. "We've actually got stock going away today, trading stock, lambs that were bought from Southland and are going to Hawke's Bay this afternoon so they have had a good stopover, it was quite frustrating we weren't able to capitalise on the opportunity." Further down the valley, sheep and beef farmer Donald Ladley is also busy cleaning up after the back-to-back floods. "After the last rain we can't get tractors and vehicles around on hillsides, it's not safe to take even an ATV on the hillside where the sheep mobbed, we've probably lost around 10 hectares of ground." Eighty Eight Valley farmer Donald Ladley. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ In one block, silt had covered eight paddocks, with two left and Ladley said he could be faced with having to sell stock. It had taken two years to reinstate fences on another part of his property damaged by previous floods, with the river washing away the land several times. "A bulldozer just turned up at lunchtime to start working to try and push some gravel back to secure some banks so we might be able to put some fences back up, or it'll have to be temporary fences, but temporary fences and ewes and lambs aren't very good. "It makes you wonder what the summer's going to bring forth when we've had so much already rain." Federated Farmers national president Wayne Langford said the successive floods in the last three weeks caused significant damage, with farmers in a race against time to clean up before spring. "Farmers are used to dealing with weather events, as you can imagine, but this one was extraordinary in a number of cases of schools, extraordinary damage. We're a month away from the busiest time of year on farm with calving and lambing and we need to get these properties cleaned up as quick as we can and back into action." HortNZ chief executive Kate Scott said many growers had suffered extensive damage to their orchards, infrastructure and access. The Quail Valley River has scoured out land either side of it, taking some of the road with it. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ "Growers are resilient and used to challenges, but this recent weather has been particularly challenging due to the number of events in close proximity to each other." Tasman Mayor Tim King has warned more bad weather is on the cards and people should keep that in mind during the clean-up. "We're locked in a weather pattern that's been repeating for itself for the best part of two months. We've had two very significant events during that period and dodged one in the middle, I'm concerned given the comprised nature of our roading network and our rivers network, and the sodden nature of most of the region." MetService and NIWA confirmed the likelihood of more weather events through the end of July, into August with a large amount of rain. "We're very much hoping that they don't come to the same extent as the ones we've just been through." Tasman Mayor Tim King. Photo: Samantha Gee / RNZ He said the council was focused on repairing roads, access to properties and the river network, especially where stopbanks had been compromised, work which had been made more urgent ahead of heavy rain expected in the extended forecast through the end of July and into August. "But given how wet the region is, how compromised the river network is, even events that don't reach the level of rainfall we've received over the last two or three weeks have the potential to be quite impactful." In the meantime, Civil Defence are still visiting those in cut off areas as more than 40 local roads remain closed and there are around eight properties in the district without power. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
