MEDIA RELEASE

17 December 2010

Select Committee Report on Food Bill Disappointing

The Primary Production Select Committee’s report back on the Food Bill is disappointing because it does not deal with any food industry concerns, says Food and Grocery Council Chief Executive, Katherine Rich.

Mrs Rich says that the Bill remains largely unchanged and does not address any of the concerns we raised on behalf of some of New Zealand’s largest food exporters.

“While the Committee has made some changes to improve the oversight of sausage sizzles and charitable jam-making, none of the significant issues raised by our multi-billion dollar food industry have been addressed.

“The Bill still requires that all food must be produced to New Zealand rules even if the rules for the export market where that the food is destined are different.

“We told the Committee that in some circumstances producing food to New Zealand rules will mean New Zealand products are denied access to international markets. When our economy relies on the performance of our exporting companies, this is obviously a nonsense situation.

“There is a process outlined in the Bill to get exemptions, but is over it is overly clunky, bureaucratic and will be costly to New Zealand food companies. I am sure the Governor General and Cabinet have better things to do than sign off exemptions so that export success stories like Steinlager can be labelled to United Kingdom specifications.

Mrs Rich says that while FGC supports the punishment of firms that wilfully produce unsafe food, it remains concerned about the massive hike in penalties in the Bill. The Bill proposes fines that begin at around $50,000 for individuals and range up to $500,000 for a company. This is a tenfold increase on the current penalties.

“As a country dominated by small to medium enterprises the level of these fines could overwhelm a business rather than penalise the business for an offence. This could send many small and medium businesses to the wall, sometimes just for the sake of non-compliance with a minor technical labelling requirement.

There is still time for these important issues to be addressed in further readings of the Bill. We will continue to seek changes to this important piece of legislation, Mrs Rich said.

ENDS

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