Federated Farmers president Don Nicholson has taken a shot at the size of government, saying it acted like a fiscal hoover behind the pressure on the Kiwi dollar and the sluggish economy.
Meanwhile, Nicholson attacked the "xenophobic" Save our Farms campaign and overseas investment rules touted by the National and Labour parties. He also raised concerns about the Government's wish for more 'value-added' exports.
Problem is government
"We need savings from Government," Nicholson said at Fed Farmers' National Council in Wellington.
"New Zealand doesn't have either a savings or an investment problem, we have a big government problem," he said.
"Today government consumes 44% of our economy - eight percent more than what it did in 2000. That's NZ$30 billion in real terms. NZ$30 billion year-upon-year-upon-year."
Nicholson blamed the growth in government on the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) electoral system.
"Governments have embraced MMP's dark praetorian truth - you have to bribe the electorate on a scale that would have made Richard Seddon blush.
"The only political game in town is to 'maximise' the party vote by hook or crook," he said.
Value added
Nicholson took aim at those in government and academia who wished New Zealand to be some "Rolls Royce" in terms of the quality of its export products.
"[They want it so] that we are so unique we can extract a high premium for Made in New Zealand," he said.
"If there's a bar to jump farmers ask why, but our government responds by asking for it to be raised even higher.
"As a farmer and as Federated Farmers President, our automotive benchmark should not be Rolls Royce but rather Toyota or Nissan.
"In other words we should focus on mass markets where premium is derived from craftsmanship, quality, reliability and trust that builds loyalty."
Economic Development Minister Gerry Brownlee said last month that New Zealand should be looking to export more value-added processed food and beverages, instead of just primary exports such as milk powder.
“The maths is pretty simple – a kilo of infant formula is worth ten times the value of a kilo of milk powder – so we know which one New Zealand should be selling,” Brownlee said.
After today's speech, Nicholson told interest.co.nz a big part of the problem was that compliance costs for businesses wishing to start up in New Zealand were too high.
“Businesses don’t like working in New Zealand because of our compliance regimes. It’s not easy to set up business in this country – even though we’re decreed to be one of the more friendly countries in the world, the cost of doing business here is relatively high," he said.
"Why would people come to a relatively high cost economy when they can go and do the same thing in a lower cost economy, [where] they take the raw ingredients, process to a point here and then take it somewhere else for further processing?
"I understand New Zealand says ‘why can’t we have the whole business here?’ That’s smart. Let’s make it easier for businesses to do that.
"You go from RMA to local government to central government cost structures. When you’ve got big government as it is heading towards 50% of our GDP, you’ve just got to think that, pretty much 50% of what everyone does has an influence of government in it," he said.
Save our Farms "Xenophobic"
Nicholson said he was stunned by the Save the Farms campaign. It reeked of hypocrisy, he said.
"I am a cynical Scot by heritage. So when I see a Remuera property developer part of this group, I have my doubts about the purity of their motives.
"Is it myopia or naked self interest? If you are a Remuera property developer, wouldn't you like to buy low? I mean, farms are also land banks.
"But no, they just wish to save our farms because we Kiwis love property. We all love property, but it seems we love the property of other people even more."
Nicholson noted that foreign high net worth investors may be able to skip around overseas investment rules proposed by Labour and National.
"If you have at least NZ$10 million in New Zealand you can apply for New Zealand residence under the Investor Plus category," he said.
Nicholson then raised the example of Anders Crofoot, who is president of Federated Farmers Wairarapa.
"He's an American who moved here in 1998 with his wife Emily and family. He took citizenship in 2005 and is an example of the talented farming migrants we need to re-fresh the New Zealand farming system with new ideas, new concepts and new blood.
"Would he have moved here under the Save Our Farms xenophobia or the rules now being considered by some political parties? No he would not," Nicholson said.
"I also need to remind people that the Chinese have been in New Zealand for a very long time. One of our first ever dairy cooperatives was established by Chew Chong in Taranaki," he said.
The market was a good place in which to decide ownership of New Zealand farm land, Nicholson said.
"We’ve got private title, and we’ve got people wanting to meddle. The market’s a good place for that meddling to happen, and we don’t need people like the group Save our Farms encouraging the meddling."
"You’ve got to wonder where New Zealand wants to be. No one takes the land away. You pay tax in New Zealand, you employ New Zealand people, with New Zealand residence. New Zealand was founded on foreign investment."
* More to come. Prime Minister John Key will address the council at 4:15 this afternoon, while former South Canterbury Finance CEO Sandy Maier will talk here tomorrow.
(Updates with more on Save the Farms, Value added debate)
65 Comments
Ohhh really, And how many businesses of late have ask for or taken government handouts or asked for tax relief at the taxpayers expense?
CHCH businessesseeking compo and farmers wanting compo for filling in holes on their own property due to earthquake
Warner Bros got their handout in the form of a subsidy
Kiwifruit growers now want a handout due to their own negligence
I run 3 businesses, I don't ask for or try to 'bribe' or 'blackmail' the NZ taxpayers for anything! Part of running a business is ACCEPTING LOSS from time to time, EVEN if excessive. Kitchen to hot? GET OUT!
"Governments have embraced MMP's dark praetorian truth - you have to bribe the electorate on a scale that would have made Richard Seddon blush.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=106…
So when I read this I need to ask , who's going to benefit most, the biggest slice always goes to those at the top, the rest get enough to think they are winning.
I suppose he considers this to be xenophobic as well:
SHANGHAI—China announced new limits on the ability of foreigners to buy residential or commercial property on the mainland, in its latest effort to curb the inflows of speculative money into its economy and ease inflationary pressure.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704584504575615942546998222.html
Nothin wrong with looking after your own patch, if you ask me
Great article by Don Nicholson.
Matthew Hooton did a great one in the NBR recently. Apparently only 3% of dairy production worldwide, is "traded"? The rest is done locally.
Value added would seem to be about the only way to go.
I would like to know what Don Nicholson thinks of the nonsense from council urban planners that involves making "value adding" urban businesses pay 20 times as much per hectare for their land, than what farmland just outside the urban limits would cost them, but which they are not allowed to convert from non-farming uses.
Silicon Valley got going because of the ability for whizkids with next to no money, to utilise cheap land near a Uni. It couldn't happen in regulated-to-death California today. Or in NZ. How many future "Microsofts" or Gallaghers or Rakons are we foregoing? Good luck if you're NZ's potential Bill Gates, trying to get finance for a million-dollar "first premises", at 18 years old and having dropped out of Uni, and with nothing to offer as collateral except a whole host of brainwaves that no banker is going to understand.
Most farmers I know are good folk. They husband their land, know the state of each paddock, and care what they hand on to their kids.
Nicholson speaks for an increasing minority, if you'll pardon the inversion.
They may have Swedes in common - food for lack of thought, maybe.
Good gutsy comments by Don. When I first saw the ‘Save our Farms’ campaign I thought those behind it must be appealing to their bankers or other financiers who were about to sell them up. Then I realised they weren’t talking about their own farms: they wanted to exercise state power over other people’s property. Isn’t there a word for that political philosophy? In a free society like ours it’s always open to one of the ‘savers’ to pay the best price.
by Roger Kerr, executive director of the New Zealand Business Roundtable
"It is not clear today what resources will eventually replace New Zealand’s current energy sources. But substitution is bound to occur. Fission and fusion energy both provide possible substitutes, along with renewable sources such as sun, wind, water and the earth’s internal heat. The immediate potential of renewables is strictly limited, however: in 1998 wind and solar power accounted for just 0.05 percent of world energy production. This low share is simply a consequence of renewables not yet being competitive with fossil fuels. But with the cost of solar energy and wind energy dropping (by 94-98 percent over the last 20 years), each is becoming closer to being profitable.
Correction to the Govt's 44 % of GDP
Add in SOE's + Local Gov't ( That pillar of productivity ) and we have Gov't way over 50 % of the economy !
Aren't going to catch anyone while this is the situation except maybe overtake Slovenia on the way down the GDP / capita ranks of the OECD.
Even Eastern Europe - remember the Polish shipyards - never got to these levels before going tits up.
Just time now - Borrowed money on borrowed time !
The OECD eh?
Nothing like a line in the sand.
Line -------------- linear
Same nonsenser with the 'catch up with Ausatralia' drivel.
My better half is from there, and we made the decision to live here, as has more going for it.
Water, for instance.
Lack of desert, for another.
The OECD eh?
Nothing like a line in the sand.
Line -------------- linear
Same nonsense with the 'catch up with Australia' drivel.
My better half is from there, and we made the decision to live here, as has more going for it.
Water, for instance.
Lack of desert, for another.
The government is all of us.
Not some remote entity, to be blamed for your lack of whatever it is you lack.
You're either disingenuous, and know that putting operations into private hands allows a small clique to screw the mass populace, or you're stupid.
Inefficiencies? Address them by all means. Having done so, all things being equal, we're down by the profit margin in your scenario.
What I find rather amusing, is that the 'Govt is too big' folk, are also the 'growth forever is possible' folk.
If growth was unlimited, who would give a rats arse how big the Govt was? It's only because we are up against the limits, that they're eyeing it off.
Overshoot crossover 1980. Thatcher/Reagan/Douglas et al shortly thereafter. Hello?
Average production per cow in NZ is 3868 litres per year, in Germany its 7100 litres per cow per year. Bit hard to be the mass market reliable one when you arent even half the size of merely one of your competitors.
The wealthiest countries in the world are the ones who specialise in high end products. Why do you think Toyota developed Lexus?
There might be a few farmers in the Kiwifruit sector who will be grateful for government assistance. Same old story, when things are good farmers preach self-reliance, when things are bad they want help, just like everyone else, but pretend it's not really government spending .
"Nicholson speaks for an increasing minority.."
He sounds like a libertarian wacko... yet again
"increasing" as in shrinking numbers? or increasing as in bigger numbers?......
Mind you they did get from 850 votes in 2005 to 1000 votes in 2008....about a 10th of Destiny Church?
;]
I sometimes wonder,,,,we seem to have some extremely small but extremely noisey out there wacko politics pushing fringe loon policies that dont even relate to 99% of ppl let alone +50% and he complains about MMP. Something he should be grateful for, we have ACT who now have a voice and a few MPs as a result.......He should get used to it, its what a decent % of the ppl want, some representation....except for the big two parties supporters of course....
regards
"It needs to be noted that New Zealand had the highest GDP per capita IN THE WORLD in 1920 - if readers would lile to check out the work by the late great macroeconomist Angus Maddison. His website is superb."
So who or what is behind the idea that we need a bigger population?
"It needs to be noted that New Zealand had the highest GDP per capita IN THE WORLD in 1920 - if readers would lile to check out the work by the late great macroeconomist Angus Maddison. His website is superb."
So who or what is behind the idea that we need a bigger population?
Classic selectivity by a spin doctor.
"Great". Superb".
That's just your hyped opinion, Hugh.
How about facing some facts - looked at that IEA report yet? Seen the bark blue bit?
No, I'll bet you havent, and I've a fair idea why.
The question to be asked when contemplating types like you, Kerr, Nicholson, is this: do you say what you say because you seriously believe the nonsense?
Or are you all well aware of the realities, and setting it up so a select clique (which you presume includes yourselves) get to win as the 'long emergency' unfolds?
"Governments have embraced MMP's dark praetorian truth - you have to bribe the electorate on a scale that would have made Richard Seddon blush."
Ignoring the country with the biggest pork barrel politics and a 2 party state in the World, the USA.....no MMP there mate...
JK etc had to move to the centre in order to gain enough votes to get into power....this would have had to occur under MMP or FPP.....he seems to miss this....
Shows the weight of his argument is hot air.
If this representative is the best that farmers can get...well...oh dear.
regards
Total red hearing and a cheap way to have a go at MMP.
Does he not think the first time the country had 9 years in a row of a left wing government hadanything to do with it?
While there was a worldwide boom on and a massive tax take to boot.
What a joke, total lack of credibility blaming it on MMP, it works pretty well for Germany doesn't it?
Many FF are nothing but a bunch of 'blackmailers'. The day we make you clean up our rivers and lakes is COMING! AND the day you all pay REAL market rates for water usage also.
The NZ consumer pays international 'market rates' for their products at the expense of OUR land and water quality. Time to clean house. The subsidies for these thugs must end.
How about the urban areas lead by example Justice - stop using the waterways as convenient sewerage system 'overflows' when systems breakdown, towns and cities 'can't afford to ugrade' their plants, storm water systems can't cope in times of heavy rain etc. And actually pay for the water they use as opposed to paying for the capital costs involved in getting water to households.
Oh, and limit population growth while you are at it - after all towns and cities that increase in population use more and more of our resources and increase the environmental pollution levels also.
CO- well said. Proper accounting for Natural Capital, and limiting population growth to replacement.
Done properly, that would do it ...........
but these folk have no idea of the real cost of Natural Capital - they duck and weave at a teensy charge on carbon. That wouldn't even register against the proper accounting of finite resource draw-downs, full recycling, zero waste and all on renewable energy.
This is a discourse about deckchairs, in the big scheme of things.
under MMP we get a mangled policy chioce. The extreme positions of the minor parties aren't discarded as in FPP and so your left having to eat a cake with Maori Nationalist raisins and global warming isn't happening almonds ( or Maori Nationalist Greens with Waihopai Spybase paranoia sauce combined with the cloth cap of the worker and high immigration).
Nicholson has a fair point, National have been very disappointing to date. How can they justify running a 13 billion dollar deficit, whilst still paying WFF, leaving student loans interest free etc. We just need to toughen up and take our medicine and live within our means.
The conservative/Lib Dem coalition are really hooking into it over in the UK and seem to be taking the people with them. The public can understand when needs must and strong leadership is given.
National have got caught trying to be all things to all people and tweaking here and there isnt what we need. Key loves the popularity and seems prepared to do anything to protect it. Act should be having a fielday at the moment but have disintegrated into trough swilling and decietfullness and lack any credibility. I wouldnt put the farm on it not being a Labour/Green/Maori coalition come 2011.
Could this guy Nicholson explain in words of one syllable how farmers can justify paying those high prices for farms.
No true business person would ever dream of paying more than they had to for earned business income.
Oh I know. Blame the banks for being profligate with our money (and that of Japanese housewives) to tell them they have a great deal that earns them 1% or 2% return.
D'ya see the one tonne of the stuff that the Italian el Fuzza nabbed ? 1000 times the size of our operation ! However , I can soothe my soul with the thought that I'm the backbone of the country .
Funnily enough , one can live in the country without actually getting sheep shit on one's designer gummyboots .
I used to work at the CHCH Press in Gloucester Street ........... And I'd hardly call it a softer environment , Hugh . Unless you revel in hookers / pimps / dealers / and bare-knuckle action . ................. And it was even worse than that out on the street , in public !
Two things primarily Mike - grain feeding and the use of indoor housing for all or part of the year. You are comparing two completely different systems - one grass fed (NZ) and one where cows are housed inside for part, if not all, of the year. High producing cows in Europe etc generally do not 'last' as long as NZ cows. i.e. because they produce so much their udders usually give out after about 5 years, whereas a NZ cows 'lasts' 8 - 10 years. There will be exceptions to these figures but that is a broad generalisation. Breeding does also play a part in it, but the high producers in Europe etc usually do not 'last' well on the traditional NZ all grass, outdoor system. They also do not usually produce any better in A NZ system. They are bred for a different type of feeding system. Artificial growth hormones are also used in some countries to increase milk production.
NZ is one of the few countries in the world who do not allow the use of artificial growth hormones that increase milk production.
This was brought home to me when taking a grandchild to the Dr in the UK and the Dr took a swipe at hormone use (and therefore the perception of it in milk in the supermarket) and was very surprised when I said we don't use them in NZ.
Fonterra is listed as 5th on the table of top 25 Global Dairy Companies, whereas Germany doesn't get a mention until 15th.
http://www.milchindustrie.de/en/teaser_en/top_25_world/ This link is in English. :-)
Yes, why do Fonterra use vacuous phrases when they could use hard hitting stuff like this?
Their current stupid advert shows a self satisfied slob wallowing in crap. They just do not understand their customers. They routinely excuse appalling practices. Excuse me while I bang my head against the wall. Why do they not realise we would like to be proud of them if they would let us? Instead they portray themselves as a hopeless bunch of inbred idiots in the hope that we will feel matey with them. Sigh.
Why should the size of the government be a problem to farmers? Since when did farmers pay tax for all this?
I know a Taranaki dairy farmer, farm been in the family for generations, 500 odd cows. New Falcon every two years. He claims Community Services Card, & all the benefits that go with declaring virtually no income. Pretty well all household, transport etc costs are deducted from his income. GST ditto all claimed back. If he were ever to sell, no capital gains tax. No land tax either in NZ. No fart tax either of course.
I was talking to a woman recently who works in an accountants office in a rural area, she commented it is absolutely incredible what farmers can legitimately claim as costs.
Cheers to all.
Interesting comment.
When people have suggested ag. is the backbone of NZ, delivering the lions share of export revenue, I've often asked about the size of the tax take delivered by ag./farmers, but so far nobody has seemed to want to answer that.
Perhaps a job for the Int.co team?
Cheers, Les.
I agree, it would be interesting to see this figure, Les but perhaps it would be a subjective figure. e.g. Some farms are structured as companies owned by family trusts who 'pay' shareholders/beneficiaries a salary. Do you include all three tax entities (co, trust, individuals) in the figure, or just the company?
Philly put away the green eyed monster. Farmers can't claim anymore than anyone else who runs a business from home. You can claim a percentage of power, phone etc - just as any home based business can. When we stopped living on the farm and I was self employed as an independent contractor working from home, I was able to claim exactly what we had been claiming when living on the farm. Urban dwellers like to ignore the fact that urbanites running home based businesses get the same tax breaks.
Many farmers lease their cars though I am not saying this is what your friend does. If they own stock then their taxable income can vary hugely depending on which IRD livestock scheme their stock are in. The IRD sets the values every year and for some in times of falling values they may have a considerable write off, and like wise if values go up they will have a considerble tax liability.
I argue that the rates we pay are a form of land tax. We pay over $10,000 a year in rates yet our farm is on a gravel road, the local community has provided (paid for and built) most of the communities assets, our road is frequently in an unsafe state (especially for the school buses that go down it) despite the council being made aware of when the problem arises, we have no footpaths, street lighting, refuse collection etc etc. So just what are my rates going to pay? I put up on a thread some time ago how we have multiple titles to our farm (a common occurrence) and 3 different designations - dairy, general farming, lifestyle. It is the dairy farm designation rate per $1000 of value considerably more despite adjoining the lifestyle designated property.
As to capital gains tax - what capital gains advantage do farmers have over any other business in NZ - remembering of course if a farmer buys and sells a farm within 10years the IRD can charge capital gains tax if they deem it to be appropriate.
Farmers do have the benefit of income equalisation available to them. Not sure if there is any similar mechanism for other SMEs. It doesn't stop you paying tax, only defers it. I personally have never used income equalisation - just paid the tax when it was due seemed to be just as simple.
Casual observer: Hardly the green eyed monster. It sounds as tho you are partly a hill country farmer, probably sheep & beef, & I certainly feel empathy for most of them. In fact my Dad had just such a farm, but not the life for me, so my choice not to do it. When it comes to access issues, theft, rustling, weather calamities etc I am very sympathetic. Plus the fluctuating & often pathetic returns from wool & meat.
However, you don't answer my comments at all, which rather seems to confirm them. Nicholson grizzles about "big government". Local body rates pays zero percent of the health/education/soclal welfare etc government services. Their purpose is to maintain local infrastructure, such as gravel roads in the hill country, which observations shows are hideously expensive to maintain in erosion-prone country.
My accounting informant tells me that most "businesses from home" can only charge a proportion of house costs against the business. My wife does exactly that. However farmers can say that the house is owned by the business, rather than the business "leasing" part of the house, so a far greater share of costs can be claimed.
You are quite right that some other businesses can take advantage of the favourable tax situation that farmers are in, for instance as the only OECD country with no capital gains tax. Landlords are another beneficiary, and I think they realise they are safe from any CGT ever being introduced, as the Feds would never allow it. Part of the reason for our ongoing obsession with rental properties, with the resulting disastrous imbalances in our economy.
Thanks for replying, I think this is a worthwhile debate.
Cheers to all.
I would be interested to hear views from those accountants who watch the threads on your comments re houses. I understood that a few years ago IRD tightened up on house expenses etc. We are absentee owners so don't get to claim any house expenses.
Not a sheep farmer Philly, but a dairy farmer on flat country, 20kms from town :-)
One has to wonder if rural communities weren't best served when grader drivers lived in the rural communities and all roads were graded regularly, as they were when I was a kid growing up in the Waikato.
Farmers are taxpayers and reflective of those self employed SMEs owners. Like other SME sectors not all will be taxpayers, but there will be taxpayers among them. Therefore the size of government is a concern to them as
a)as a group they are taxpayers,
b)compliance costs for SMEs are ever increasing. Significant amount of compliance requirements add no value to neither the SME nor to the agency requiring the information, however it does seem to create a gravy train of employment.
Farmers are no different to any other SME sector - it's just that they had a presence of mind years ago to organise themselves under the Feds banner and to raise awareness of potential issues affecting them as business owners. Someone has to do it. ;-)
“Nicholson took aim at those in government and academia who wished New Zealand to be some "Rolls Royce" in terms of the quality of its export products.”
"As a farmer and as Federated Farmers President, our automotive benchmark should not be Rolls Royce but rather Toyota or Nissan.”
Not really a possibility thinker is he? He sounds like a typical old New Zealand yeah-butt. “
Suggestion A. “Hey, let’s make New Zealand as prosperous as we can!” Typical old New Zealand response, “Yeah butt......”
Suggestion B. “I think we could add value to our products by doing C” Typical old New Zealand response, “Yeah butt.....”
Suggestion C. “Before this decade is out, we should put a man on the moon”. Typical old New Zealand response, “Yeah butt.....”
Get him out of the Presidency!
A good article by Federated Farmers president Don Nicholson. Rolls Royce leaks oil, unreliable and overpriced. Toyota is reliable and affordable, has good resale value and high repeat customers. That's why Toyota is No1 today.
Chew Chong pioneered the packaging and export of 1lb butter blocks to the UK, and was instrumental in getting the coolstore built at the Taranak wharf to assist dairy export. You will find lots of interesting historical facts at www.pukeariki.com (by typing Chew Chong in the search box) about this pioneer.
In business, mutual trust, fairness and respect are very important ingredients in building a good business relationship. The way we target Chinese investment in this country will have some serious long term implications for businesses. NZ is not the only option for Chinese to invest in either farming or any other industries, there are many emerging countries which offer similar, better or friendlier investment environments for the Chinese. Perhaps an alternative way to handle the Crafer farm sale is by proposing an JV deal like 51%NZ and 49% Chinese, this way we still have the control over the whole business, at the same time securing a huge market for the products the farms produce, the Chinese still gets a smaller bite of the cherry, a win win situation for everyone. A smart business will look at locking up its customer to some form of sole/exclusive supply arrangement, as a hedge against any future global oversupply of dairy products, as more and more countries develop their own dairy industries. The biggest loser now is the Crafar farm current owner and its creditors, as no buyer in NZ is yet to match the purchase price offered by the Chinese. May be the "save our farm" supporters should get together to purchase the Crafar Farm from the current owner!
"May be the "save our farm" supporters should get together to purchase the Crafar Farm from the current owner!"
yes but before we have a good laugh let's go back and look at what lead to asset price inflation which groups influenced government policy and which groups benefited. That argument isn't settled but we do know there was a massive horizontal shift in wealth.
http://www.listener.co.nz/issue/3314/features/1021/house_of_the_rising_…
Good Quote by John Key:
Concerned about the Chinese buying up NZ's productive base
Meanwhile, Key also let on as to what he said was the main driver behind the rule changes to the Act - to do with the increasing possibility of large land aggregations made by states like China as food security issues loom.
"What we were worried about was a scenario, not where an individual or a company came in and bought a farm, but we can see that long term food security issues are genuine issues that countries like China and those with a very large population are considering," Key said.
"And they could easily, if they wanted to, go in and buy a very large part of the productive base in New Zealand," he said.
"Even if it wasn’t economic today, on the basis that they’ve got 1.3 billion people to feed in years to come, and all the economics tell you they do not have enough arable land to feed their people as their population not only rises, but their wealth rises and they demand higher prices.
"That could have quite a lot of implications for Fonterra, for our productive sector and for the way that we operate.
"So that’s the rationale behind the rule change – to try and reflect that there might be a changing pattern in there," he said.
http://www.interest.co.nz/rural-news/new-overseas-investment-act-rules-…
Mathew Hooten: "if [that] seller can't sell to a foreigner he can't get the best price"
Chris trotter replies: " people used to be hung drawn and quartered for selling out to foreigners"
"tell you they do not have enough arable land to feed their people as their population not only rises,"
He's close. Ths is the first time John Key has mentioned limits to growth.
He may not realise that's what he's done, but I think he's smart enough that he does. Which puts him ahead of some here knocking him.
Sure, if they could continue to get 'wealthy', they'd want more beef and less rice, thus needing more land than they have.
His next step is to realise that they won't get 'wealthy', and the Peak Oil report he has on the table, explains why.
Ignorance is no excuse, eh Hugh?
Take a look at your average tour bus driver these days people who look like they have stepped straight off the streets of Shanghai are getting close to parity with native Kiwis. Add those in unmarked rental vans speaking into a microphone and they possibly out number us.
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