MPI ‘too big and struggling’

Labour is calling for the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) to be split back up because it’s ‘‘too big’’ and failing industries like the lucrative manuka honey business.

Labour Primary Industries spokesman Damien O’Connor said the 2012 merger of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Ministry of Fisheries and the New Zealand Food Safety Authority was meant to be about efficiency.

‘‘In my view it’s simply too big an organisation to have the expertise required in these very technical areas of food safety, of biosecurity, and other areas that are crucial to our economy.

‘‘I think MPI is struggling to maintain the capability to do this kind of work,’’ he said.

O’Connor’s comments come on the back of an interview with MPI’s deputy director of general regulation and assurance, Bryan Wilson, who acknowledged there was a problem with the testing of manuka honey, which MPI is working to fix.

The Government released its scientific definition to authenticate New Zealand manuka honey in April, which is the first step towards a standard.

The industry earns $242 million in exports a year, of which manuka honey makes up about 80 per cent. But some producers say up to 20 per cent of the purest honey - worth about $10m to $20m is failing MPI testing.

Wilson told Radio NZyesterday, the fact some ‘‘tweaking’’ needed to be done to the testing wasn’t an issue.

‘‘When you go through a new testing regime you need to adjust laboratory methods to take account of samples that behave differently - it’s part of a normal process.’’