Click here for our 2020 Farming for the Future Plan
Aotearoa can have a thriving and sustainable agricultural sector that responds to the challenge of climate change while protecting food security, producing high value exports, preserving and enhancing the natural environment, and contributing to flourishing rural communities.
Intensive agriculture pollutes our waterways, degrades our land, warms our planet, and endangers biodiversity. Decades of focus on quantity over quality has left many farmers in debt and at risk from market changes and economic shocks.
Our food production systems can change. Sustainable food production is crucial to Aotearoa’s long-term prosperity.
The Green Party supports regenerative and organic farming practices. These methods are natural, enhance land and water quality, and increase biodiversity. They ultimately produce clean, green products which command higher prices in export markets.
Our vision is for an agricultural sector that sustainably feeds Aotearoa and the world; protects and enhances the environment; and contributes to the continued success and vibrancy of Aotearoa’s rural communities.
The Green Party will:
- Support regenerative agriculture in New Zealand, so farming practices improve the ecosystems they rely on.
- Phase-out the most environmentally degrading agricultural inputs, such as synthetic fertilisers and harmful pesticides, and ban Palm Kernel Expeller (PKE) imports.
- Support farmers to transition to organic agriculture, provide support for up-scaled farm advisory services, and fix the Organic Products Bill to give the organics sector a fair go.
- Establish a sustainability accreditation scheme for agricultural products created in Aotearoa, to ensure consumers in Aotearoa and overseas can see their food has been sustainably produced.
- Extend country-of-origin labelling to all food products.
- Promote urban agriculture, food forests, and food growing in towns and cities.
- Work with farmers to urgently develop a fair and science- based way to measure and price agricultural greenhouse gas emissions, including recognising the value of on-farm tree planting.
- Model environmentally sustainable farming with Pāmu-Landcorp.
- Protect productive food-growing land from urban sprawl.
- Encourage government agencies to buy locally grown food and timber products.