Lee Smith, Groundswell co-ordinator. PHOTO SUPPLIED
Lee Smith, Groundswell co-ordinator
The Dutch farmers fought long and hard to retain their farms against formidable international forces that conspired to remove them from their land, which would have resulted in the obliteration of one of the most valuable food-producing areas in Europe.
The farmers came to the cities in droves. Tractors and farm vehicles clogged the highways, and commerce ground to a halt for months. The Dutch — urban and rural — stood together in support of the farmers, which has so far given them a tenuous hold on their property.
How was it that the Dutch farmers had such support from their country?
A glimpse back in history sheds some light on that, for the ancestors of the Dutch today endured years of starvation during World War II. Their descendants were brought up on stories of their parents and grandparents who suffered from varying degrees of starvation between the years of 1939 and 1945. At one stage, many thousands were reduced to eating tulip bulbs. WW2 was fought on their soil too and the fascist Nazi regime ensured that what food Holland was able to produce was sent to Germany, or used to feed their army.
New Zealanders experienced severe rationing during the years of war, but few were reduced to the pitiful rations experienced by the Dutch, so European New Zealanders have not known what it is like to have little or no food.
But the Dutch do know. It is embedded in their family history, and so their support of farmers remaining on their farms and continuing to produce food was given without question.
Traditionally, the top producers of New Zealand’s income came from farming and tourism. Farmers strived to produce the best wool and meat and earned an enviable reputation for supplying some of the world’s best. Quality primary produce has always been shipped off-shore and sold at a premium. The taxed income from these sales provided funding for hospitals, schools, libraries, roads and enabled New Zealand to invest in its infrastructure to help keep it as self-sufficient as possible.
Today Parliament seems intent on tearing down the ability of our farmers to produce good food through restrictive and unworkable laws, compliances and reports that keep farmers trapped in their offices when they need to be out farming.
Other policies chip away at the land available to farm and destroy farming communities. One example of this is encouraging off-shore investors to buy our premium farmland and plant it in pine trees to offset their pollution in other countries.
They are even assisted by the Government to do so. Some key disadvantages to this scheme are: There is less fertile land for farming, so less food for our people and exports; small country towns, and their infrastructure and small businesses, that support farming communities, wither and die, and subsequently add to unemployment figures; there is no reduction of pollution; there is increased fire-risk, and we have witnessed what happens in flooded areas, with the build-up of slash from these plantations.
New Zealand’s population is becoming increasingly aware it is facing a food crisis. We all see rising grocery costs and emptier shelves at the supermarkets. These shortages are not because we cannot produce food, but because we have our farmers jumping through bureaucratic hoops that produce nothing, and reduce our food production. The pork industry in New Zealand has been almost destroyed, as has the poultry industry. As an example, the Government welcomes imported pork that in many cases doesn’t come up to the standards that Kiwi farmers uphold.
Being a former dairy farmer and GroundswellNZ area coordinator, I have seen and heard first-hand the heart-wrenching frustrations and disappointments of farmers across, not only the Taranaki-King Country region, but the entire nation.
It is time we recognise, once again, the vital role that rural New Zealand plays in the prosperity of our country. Their heavy-lifting should be rewarded, not punished.
The Dutch farmers won. They did it. The silent majority in New Zealand — both town and country combined — need to speak up as well, before it is too late.
