The Government is being urged to make healthy national food supply a priority. 

Growers can currently only farm vegetables with consent from regional authorities and want changes as part of resource management reform. 

Horticulture NZ says without urgent change to this, the country risks losing a significant portion of its homegrown food supply by 2030. 

Vegetables NZ Chair John Murphy told Mike Hosking that growers in key areas such as Horowhenua face the real prospect of overzealous local authority officials pulling up the driveway and telling them not to grow there anymore.  

He says the burden of regulation is massive here. 

“You heard the Prime Minister talk about barnacles on the boat slowing us down earlier in the week ... this isn’t a barnacle on the boat slowing us down, this is a hole in the boat.”  

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