Guy NathanHon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): It is a great opportunity to take a call in the annual review debate for 2015-16 and I want to thank the Parliament for the contributions that we have heard this afternoon. I will be specifically talking about the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) as the lead Minister and I do not necessarily agree with some of the contributions that I have heard across the Chamber but that is not to say that we do not all agree in this House all of the time. So I want to myth-bust some of the comments that I have heard this afternoon but importantly what I want to say is that the primary sector is in really good shape. Export earnings are at about $37.5 billion and are forecast to be $40 billion next year which is fantastic is it not—and I see a few members nodding around the Chamber—because that is—Phil Twyford: They're falling asleep Nathan.Hon NATHAN GUY: —73 to 75 percent of our merchandise exports. Mr Twyford might want to learn a little bit about the primary sector being an Auckland urbanite and he probably would not even understand where his food comes from. His food which he consumes in those flash Auckland restaurants that he is a regular visitor to comes from our hard-working farmers fishers and growers up and down the country. But I happen to have a very proud—Phil Twyford: I take offence at that!Hon NATHAN GUY: Ha ha! I am very proud of the efforts that they make in actually taking premium products not only to the top restaurants in Auckland but to about 150 markets around the world.There have been a few discussions this afternoon about a few areas that I want to touch on. It is interesting that Meka Whaitiri talked about saving at the expense of the border. I disagree with that. What she may not realise is that the biosecurity investment made by this Government is at an all-time high. What that member may not even realise is that it was quite embarrassing when I brought urgent Budget legislation through the Parliament about 18 months ago to introduce a border clearance levy which meant that instead of the taxpayer funding the costs at the border for customs and MPI it would in fact be recovered by those who used the services and that is of course about 60 percent foreigners and about 40 percent New Zealanders who come across the border.Instead of me as Minister having to go cap in hand in every Budget round back for more money for ports and for airports it means that as tourism numbers continue to grow we have more money to invest at the border. Labour and New Zealand First unfortunately voted against that and because they have done that they do not have any credibility in my view to stand up in the House and say that the Government should be investing more in biosecurity. They could not back the legislation that went through the Parliament that even the Greens had the good sense to support because the Greens are focused on biodiversity—Richard Prosser: It's just shifting the revenue stream from one place to another.Hon NATHAN GUY: —and yet New Zealand First and Labour stood up in the House—I remember their speeches. Actually to give Mr Prosser some credit he wanted to support it but he got rolled. He got rolled by the leadership within New Zealand First. So for New Zealand First and Labour to stand up and say that we need to be doing more at the border—they could not bring themselves to vote for a border clearance levy. So as we have increased tourism numbers coming across the border we are seeing more investment being made at the border which is fantastic.What New Zealand First and Labour also do not give us any credit for is that we have also increased the number of dog detector teams. We have put more people on the front line more dog detector teams—that is the dog and the handler. Those numbers have increased. We have now got more modern X-ray machines which we can move around the country—some of them are portable particularly for the cruise liner industry.What our opponents also do not want to acknowledge is that we are making a sizable investment in Wallaceville just up the road here in the Hutt Valley—$87 million is being invested in a biocontainment facility. That is basically an insurance premium for our animal industries if we do ever have an exotic animal disease scare. Hopefully we can keep our international market access open because we have got a lab that we can our do world-leading testing in. So there is a huge amount happening in the biosecurity space.Also right now specifically talking about myrtle rust because it is quite a serious issue particularly for Northland and for the country. We have found two areas with myrtle rust: one nursery and one area very close to that nursery. The 0800 number—there are a lot of calls coming through there. There is a huge amount of awareness. People are ringing up for further advice. We put in a restricted place notice when we do find an area with myrtle rust. We have got over a hundred officials working in the Kerikeri area and Department of Conservation staff as well looking at high-risk surveillance sites in Northland. There are over 300 of them. Thankfully they have not found anything on all of their inspections so far on those conservation estate sites.The public play a very important part in a biosecurity system and when I was up there on Friday I thanked this nursery owner and his staff for the great work that they did on identifying that it was indeed myrtle rust which was backed up by the scientists at the lab. Those people did the right thing.We have got the best opportunity ever because of the public awareness and the public's involvement in trying to eradicate this but it will be incredibly challenging to do because it is a wind-borne fungal disease. It is going to be incredibly challenging to eradicate it. No one has ever eradicated it before. And I have seen numerous reports. These reports talk about 20 occasions a year when it could be wind-blown in from Australia.We have been getting prepared for this since 2010. We have done a huge amount of work whether it is diagnostics—we can turn around these samples a lot quicker than we could before—whether it is germ plasm whether it is surveillance or whether it is planning. So we are prepared for this but it is going to be really challenging meaning we are doing a hell of a lot but it might be that if we have more finds in the Northland area that we need to move to a long-term management plan like we have for kauri dieback. So we are doing everything possible and the Northland community is being hugely supportive and I thank them for that.In terms of iwi engagement—because Meka Whaitiri talked about that—there was one example I think on RNZ this morning. The member might be interested to know that MPI and other officials are visiting marae in Northland. When Minister Barry and I were welcomed on to the Department of Conservation office which is the main site in Kerikeri where we will be running the response from we were welcomed by local iwi. Iwi leaders were briefed on Friday at Hopuhopu about this particular find. They are on board with what we are doing. So there is a huge amount happening in terms of iwi engagement. Just yesterday my officials were engaging with the Māori biosecurity capability network and there has been another science forum this week. So there is a lot of engagement happening to do with myrtle rust.Can I touch on a couple of other areas that were mentioned by—I think it was the member Eugenie Sage and also Meka Whaitiri about fishing. We have the Future of our Fisheries under way and we are actually getting close to rolling out the first stage of the electronic reporting. That is going to be tablets on boats and it is going to be VMS—which I commonly call GPS—vessel monitoring systems so we will know exactly where any vessel is 24 hours a day 7 days a week. They will be reporting on a tablet so we will know exactly how much they are catching. That all starts to roll out in October this year. Then we move to the next stage of cameras on these vessels. So the eyes and ears are looking across the in-trawl and deep-water fleet.And we know there is a cost for the fishing industry to comply but most fishers who I have talked to are up for it. They want to lift their social licence to operate. They catch a premium product worth about $1.8 billion of export revenue when we bring in aquaculture as well. So yes they have got some issues to do with social licence and the way that we can move the debate is by having more transparency.What has also been talked about is to do with the Primary Growth Partnership. The Primary Growth Partnership is where the Government co-invests with industry about not only looking at new market opportunities but more innovation. And when you have a look at the 19 programmes that are currently running which has a significant investment of over $700 million co-invested by the Government and industry—it is really starting to hit its straps in return and starting to grow those exports. We only need to look at the Precision Seafood Harvesting. That is a wonderful net design where fish are selected for size at sea come on board the vessel—new vessels are being built with holding tanks. It is all about freshness and premium products into market and ultimately lifting the sustainability of our fishing stocks. Then if you think about the Steepland Harvesting PGP Programme where ultimately you will have no one sitting in the cab of a digger felling trees on steep slopes—that is all about lifting productivity but also health and safety performances as well and lifting that as well.I can go on and give you other examples—whether it is the Lifestyle Wines whereby you have lower alcohol and less sugar in the wine and of course benefits with healthy lifestyles and benefits for those who want to consume wine and not get under the weather like some do. I could go on and talk about red meat—significant programmes under way there.So I guess I want to summarise now by saying that the primary sector is in a good space. MPI's goals are all about growing and protecting. The largest ever biosecurity investment made by any Government has been made by the National Government. We will always be at risk of bugs or diseases flying in or swimming in here even if we close down all of our people-to-people contact and got rid of all of our trade—and no one would want to do that because we would sink. We would be a little country in the South Pacific that could not earn its way in the world. So we need to be mindful that we have a multilayered biosecurity system. We will do everything we can to deal with myrtle rust but it is going to be challenging and our officials do a good job of protecting us whether it is in food safety—and I know Minister David Bennett is going to talk about that as well.The primary sector is the engine room of the New Zealand economy and when I hear Opposition politicians attack it it really disappoints me. It just goes to show that on this side of the House we are very focused on growing exports and protecting the New Zealand economy in things to do with biosecurity and food safety and animal welfare and actually we are doing more to do with swimmability.On the other side of the House they do not seem to care about exports. They do not care about actually giving positive speeches in the House and saying that actually the primary sector is the engine room of the New Zealand economy. We do not hear from the Greens or Labour about the importance of water storage projects. We just do not hear from them. Occasionally we hear about it from New Zealand First because it knows that the odd drought turns up in Northland. But we do not hear anything about the importance of water storage projects not only for economic growth but for the environment because you can maintain summer water flows. We do not hear the Greens or Labour because Labour actually is quite confused on the Ruataniwha and whether it supports it or not. It is quite confused whether it supports water storage projects or not. The Greens are just completely opposed. But on this side of the House we know that water storage projects are important for economic growth and they are important for the environment. Just look at the Ōpuha Dam—when that nearly ran dry it was still feeding the Ōpihi stream and we had Fish and Game out there a few years ago collecting trout species in nearby tributaries and releasing them into that river that was fed by the dam.And what is not well understood about water storage projects is that often the water flows into local towns or cities. Hunter Downs is going to get across the line shortly. That is going to put water into Waimate and Timaru. The Ōpuha puts water into Timaru. The Wairarapa water storage project is going to feed some of those towns. So there are numerous examples where water storage is hugely important for New Zealand because of the economic because of the social and because of the environmental factors as well.So the primary sector is in good heart. We are doing all that we can to support our fishers foresters growers and farmers. We are opening up new market access opportunities. Recently we had a wonderful trade announcement by our Prime Minister and Minister of Trade—$90 million invested. That means more people new market opportunities getting on and dealing with non-tariff barriers and opening up new embassies around the world. And actually we have got some challenges in this space but if anyone is going to deal with them it is going to be the National Government. Thank you very much.