Click to download the Advance NZ Agriculture Policy in PDF

Farming is the backbone of New Zealand. For generations, tangata whenua and farming families have sweated and toiled to turn this nation into a fertile and rich garden. Outside of the few large cities, most people live close to the land that feeds them, and in turn, are blessed to enjoy our tiny corner of paradise.

Successive governments have acted to destroy that legacy. Policies are being implemented that will, according to Federated Farmers, “end pastoral farming in parts of the country.

These include the: National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management 2020, the Resource Management (National Environmental Standards for Freshwater) Regulations 2020 (Freshwater NES), the Crown Pastoral Land Reform Bill, and the Resource Management (Stock Exclusion) Regulations 2020.

Taken together, they place an immense regulatory, compliance, certification, consent, and cost burden on our farmers, miners, and forestry in order to “return waterways to a pre-human state.” Farmers simply do not know what to do. Huge sections of our economy are suffering. People feel frustrated, trapped, and desperate — with no way out.

Advance NZ will repeal these regulations. We will also reverse the classification of valley floor land as riverbed, and repeal legislation that has SNAs — unopposed by Labour or National — reclassifying private property, and rendering it unusable.

We will fix rural roads and put a stop to planned taxes on water and inheritance. We will ensure the proposed National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity (NPSIB) is one that is rational and meets the needs of everyday New Zealanders.

Advance NZ wants local people to make local decisions about local issues. We will reverse the top-down imposition of overreaching standards.

We stand for the rights, freedoms, and democracy of all New Zealanders. We will allow farmers to continue farming in the traditional way, but also encourage development of regenerative farming and innovations to ensure farmers will continue to work the land long into the future.

Policy in Brief

• Repeal legislation that harms our agricultural sector.
• Repeal SNA legislation.
• Repeal the Crown Pastoral Land Reform Bill.
• Repeal the Resource Management (Stock Exclusion) Regulations 2020.
• Repeal the Resource Management (National Environmental Standards for Freshwater) Regulations 2020 (Freshwater NES).
• Build consultative groups to create new agricultural legislation tuned to New Zealand’s conditions and needs.
• Construct a national body of agriculture sector operatives to work with Government.
• Develop a green strategy for the agricultural sector.
• Repeal the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management 2020, restore the NPS 2014 (2017 amendment), and rewrite the RMA regulations to meet standards designed in New Zealand to serve New Zealand’s needs.
• Investigate and rescind the application in New Zealand of any international programs such as the United Nations’ AGENDA 21 and THE 2030 AGENDA FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT that may undermine our agriculture sector.

New Zealand-led Environmental Stewardship

Successive governments have implemented sweeping changes to our use of land and water based on commitments signed at the Rio Earth Summit, 1992, the Convention of Biological Diversity, confirmed at The Johannesburg Summit, 2002, and brought into NZ legislation with the Environment 2010 Strategy, the Sustainable Land Management Strategy, and others.

Local commitments to Agenda 21 are coordinated through Local Governments for Sustainability – the ICLEI, an international body that has set the policy Dunedin, Christchurch, Palmerston North, and Auckland have signed up to. The Biodiversity Strategy is based on ideology that puts native biodiversity over all other rights — even those of human life. We see those commitments are being enacted as changes to the Resource Management Act currently imposed upon New Zealanders.

These changes we see here are happening all around the world. They are external values that are being imposed, and are in opposition to local, New Zealand values that have grown and evolved with the people. New Zealanders have never been asked to vote on these values. The public is ignored; consultation, where it happens, is merely an empty exercise as no changes can be made. However, a number of countries are not imposing these laws, are not placing financial and legislative burden upon their agricultural industry, and are not disadvantaging their local businesses.

Advance NZ recognizes that the people who have lived on and worked the land for generations must be involved in designing appropriate and achievable environmental legislation to ensure New Zealand can be enjoyed by its people going forward. We recognize that our country is unique. Our strong and healthy bi-cultural diversity is unique in the world. We do not suffer from the same issues that plague heavily populated centres. Prior to the implementation of these external values, we had a healthy and diverse ecosystem. One size does not fit all, and we need to develop our own vision from the ground up.

We must address three key areas:

1) Environmental guardianship – to help our farmers be better at what they know best: our land usage and sustainability.

2) Social benefit – to help people from all walks of life appreciate the role of farming in our society.

3) Economic – to restore the status of agriculture and farming as a major, sustainable driver for our national economy.

We will:

• Immediately repeal freshwater, biodiversity, and land-zoning regulations that have been passed without consultation with affected parties.
• Repeal the Resource Management amendments that created SNAs, and return all reclassified land to the owners.
• Assess all recent laws, directives, or amendments to see if they disadvantage our agricultural industry for the benefit of overseas entities, or for ideological reasons — and if so, discard them.
• Recognise we need to have strong regulations around environmental stewardship, and the traditional custodians of our environment; tangata whenua and farmers are an integral part of that process.
• Reframe agricultural policy “To provide the economic environment, opportunities, resources, and appropriate legislation for our agricultural sector to flourish and thrive, whilst working together to protect our waterways, soil, and indigenous flora and fauna.”
• Form consultative groups of farmers and environmentalists to create a shared vision for the future — one where New Zealanders create mechanisms and procedures tailored to our country and its people. This will be the basis of our Green Strategy, enhancing and optimising environmentalism to meet the provincial, regional, and national needs of our agricultural sector. This locally created Green Strategy will replace international programs such as Agenda 21, and the United Nation's Sustainability 2030 Agenda.
• We will construct a national body of agricultural sector operators, including Federated Farmers, Dairy NZ, Beef & Lamb NZ, and other interested parties to work directly with Government to ensure that policy is clear, well understood, and in alignment with New Zealand’s farming sector needs.
• Remove all rural agriculture lands from the RMA Act.
• Write a new Agricultural Management Act.
• Develop, in consultation, realistic, consistent, achievable, and human, region-based regulations and freshwater standards that reinstate te mana o te wai principles of partnership and consultation for all.
• Ensure that essential water infrastructure management will remain under the control of local Councils.
• Ensure that local Council policies enhance performance of the agricultural sector, and not burden it with undue consent and compliance. This will be routinely assessed through meetings between sector representatives, Council, and Government.
• Implement industry-specific binding referendums — including farmers and tangata whenua — to manage any proposed law changes that impact the use of land for agricultural purposes.
• Engage with traditional farming experts to learn and share agricultural extension.
• Assess and simplify Health and Safety regulations in the Agricultural Sector.
• Create new trade agreements that benefit our agricultural sector.

Climate Change

New Zealand’s current approach to climate change places considerable burden on our economy, our farmers, and our lifestyle — with little real gain for the planet.

New Zealand makes about 80 million tonnes of CO2 each year.

(https://www.mfe.govt.nz/publications/climate-change/new-zealands-greenhouse-gas-inventory-1990-2018). China’s output grows by this amount, every 11 weeks. We are an extremely small emitter, and regardless of the different scientific perspectives on climate change, any efforts New Zealand makes will yield little gain if some of the world’s largest nations do not do their part.

We need to use our Kiwi Ingenuity to develop solutions for climate issues. We will manufacture solar, wind, run-of-the-river hydro, and wave technology right here.

Advance NZ will ensure a practical and New Zealand-focussed climate change policy. We believe our nation should remain competitive with those we compare ourselves to and compete with. We are opposed to penalising Kiwi farmers and kiwi families in the name of Climate Change when our country has no appreciable impact on the World’s climate.

We recognize that climate resilience is important. As vast shifts in global climate regularly occur, Advance NZ will support Change Agents and locally-driven agricultural extension services to help our farming sector respond to those climate changes.

Advance NZ will

• Pull out of unfair and damaging climate agreements, and leave the emissions trading scheme.
• Apply a levy to Chinese imports, and use that levy to directly fund the development of a New Zealand-based green industry.
• Engage with international partners to fund green technology research and development in New Zealand.
• Engage with universities to research alternative crops that may perform well in NZ, to increase sector resilience.
• Relax rules around native timber farming and recovery.

Click to download the Advance NZ Agriculture Policy in PDF