Goodhew JoAGRICULTURAL COMPOUNDS AND VETERINARY MEDICINES AMENDMENT BILLThird ReadingHon JO GOODHEW (Associate Minister for Primary Industries): I move That the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Amendment Bill be now read a third time. I want to begin this third reading debate by acknowledging again the work of the Primary Production Committee on this technical but important bill. The Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Amendment Bill will extend expand and clarify data protection in the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act 1997 and the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996. Data protection is how Government agencies use and safeguard the data that is supplied to them as part of applications to register agricultural compounds and veterinary medicines. Data protection rules prevent agencies from using the data provided by a previous applicant to assess subsequent applications to register similar products for the duration of a protected period. This is achieved however without stopping third parties from generating their own data and registering a competing product. In bringing this bill to the House my objective is to support primary industries' productivity and international competitiveness by encouraging the registration in New Zealand of new agricultural compounds and veterinary medicines (ACVM) products and new uses for existing products. However I want to ensure that this is done in such a way that we do not inhibit competition in our ACVM product markets. The revised bill before you is very different from the version introduced. The Primary Production Committee recommended a number of changes to the bill in response to submissions by users and suppliers of agricultural compounds. As I said in the second reading speech the revised bill is a balanced approach. It is balancing the issues raised by submitters and I thank the members of the committee for their diligence. The changes definitely improve the bill. The bill will make a number of revisions to the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act and for innovative products including new uses the bill is going to extend the data protection to 10 years and simplify how the data protection is actually applied. For non-innovative products including reformulations and new uses the bill is introducing data protection of 5 years. For data supplied as part of reassessments the bill introduces 5 years' data protection. The bill also clarifies and expands what qualifies as a new use. Under the bill applications would qualify for data protection if they result in a product being used on an additional species of plant or animal or a new pest or disease or if they allow different application rates methods or withholding periods. Although those changes seem pretty technical in nature they are very important to our primary industries. Data protection provides time for suppliers of agricultural compounds to recoup the cost of developing the data to support the registration application. In terms of the benefits the bill creates the right incentives for suppliers of agricultural compounds to invest in developing the data. This data is required by the regulators as well as the data needed to support any reassessments. I am confident that suppliers will respond positively and that we will see more of the innovative products being brought to our market. We will also see good products stay on the market after reassessments and products that will be registered for a wider range or broader array of uses to help our smaller sectors. The benefits of this for users of agricultural compounds are going to be higher investment in research and development and increased primary industry productivity and international competitiveness. This is particularly important for the smaller sectors. There will also be better pest and disease management and lower pesticide and antimicrobial resistance. There will be reduced risk to the environment food safety trade animal welfare and workers as we aim to phase out unsuitable products. Finally there will be stronger supply side competition as substitute products are introduced to the market over time to compete with the registered products.I would like to thank the Primary Production Committee again and also the submitters who took time to submit on the bill. I think this is an improved piece of legislation that will deliver benefits to our primary industries and in doing so to New Zealand. I commend the bill to the House.