Primary sector project review
The Government will keep the Primary Growth Partnership (PGP) programmes running until it reviews them.
Under the previous National government, the 22 PGPs were its flagship research and development programme for the primary sector, but some had been questioned by Minister of Agriculture Damien O’Connor.
‘‘Most of these programmes are funding things which should have been occurring anyway.
‘‘Anzco got $40 million of taxpayers’ money to ‘add value to a beef carcass’. I would have thought that any company would have been investigating that as part of their business,’’ O’Connor said two years ago following an audit of six PGPs.
Of the 22 programmes, six have been completed and 16 are still being carried out.
The final PGP will be completed by 2025, by when $759m would have been spent by taxpayers and industry, made up of Crown investment of $358m and industry $401m.
By August, the Crown had spent $244m since the PGPs began in 2009. Last year the New Zealand Institute for Economic Research estimated the contribution of PGP programmes to NZ’s GDP from 2025 would be $6.4 billion.
Some of the research has translated into concrete gains.
A steep slope tree harvester called the ClimbMAX has been sold to British Columbian foresters, and Fonterra has developed mozzarella which can be manufactured in a day rather than weeks.
Other projects include trying to stop merino sheep from getting footrot, developing wagyu beef by crossing with dairy breeds, and spreading fertiliser more precisely on paddocks.
Some gained a lot of early publicity but little has been heard of them since. The Seafood Precision net promises to target just the inshore species that fishers want, letting others escape. Meanwhile the targeted fish are supposed to be landed live, and will be transported to overseas markets either by air or boat.
In a speech to the Food and Fibre conference in Wellington, O’Connor said the Government would not ‘‘chop’’ the PGPs but was prioritising its spending.
‘‘We must spend it in the most effective ways. I’ve said many of these projects should be business as usual, I accept with some taxpayers’ funding it has incentivised some investigation work which we may not yet have otherwise done.’’
O’Connor acknowledged ‘‘huge progress’’ had been made with some of the PGPs.
‘‘The original criticism was around setting this up, using taxpayers’ money and spending it in such a way that gave us additional benefits for New Zealand and for the taxpayers. I stand by my focus on that return of investment.
‘‘It is essential we spend it in the best way possible.
‘‘There has been huge improvement and there are some amazing projects and huge opportunities.
‘‘Projects have taken the risk to invest to give new opportunities,’’ O’Connor said.