Part One of a Four part series that looks at the direction of New Zealands research priorities for the future, given in a speech to the NZ Institute of Agricultural and Horticultural Science.
By Dr Willam Rolleston
It is my pleasure to speak to you on research priorities for agriculture and horticulture.
Before I begin to outline some thoughts that will be challenging at times, I first wish to make comment to you on the research priorities according to New Zealander of the year, Sir Paul Callaghan.
I quote: “We are brilliantly successful at dairying, but sadly we cannot scale up this industry because of the risk of further environmental damage.” What’s more, apparently, “our dairy industry exports milk powder, rather than developing new products. Our forestry industries send raw logs offshore and despite the past capacity to invest in processing, have shown no inclination to do so.”
So there you have it. We can all pack our bags, go back to our offices, send dismissal notices to our staff and report to Ministers, the scientific community and the public, that biologically, we are as good as we can ever possibly be.
On TVNZ’s Back Benches, I was asked if we could have a vibrant agricultural sector and other exporters. It was a simple question that demanded an equally simple answer.
Of course we can.
This is not a question of ‘either or’, yet that thinking tends to bedevil our approach to research and to economic development.
I know Sir Paul has low regard for the biotech sector. In fact he wrote in the Herald: “I saw the waste of the last 10 years when we biased our science “system” to chase the Biotech fashion. We should not make the same mistake again”.
However, isn’t he making the exact same mistake in his dismissal of the biological economy and his promotion of the physical sciences economy? What I would call, “tricks and gadgets”.
Sir Paul is passionate about physics every bit as I am passionate about agriculture, biotechnology and science in general. I celebrate that our top 100 technology companies collectively export around $5 billion per annum; a quarter of Fonterra’s revenue. I would celebrate even more if 500 more technology companies existed to match what we export each year from the primary sector.
We don’t have to have a ‘tricks and gadget’ or a purely biological economy, we ought to have both. I will take it as a given that this audience has a view that our biological economy is worth investing in, so before we address the issue of priorities, let us try and put our agricultural production in a global context.
Population and food security
As a species we currently face our largest challenge ever - that is, the two people who join humanity every second, of every minute, of every hour.
In the time my session takes today, the human race will have grown by around 3,600 people.
That sobering number represents an enormous challenge to international order and our modern civilisation. Our rate of population growth means 1.2 million more people are born each week. By the end of 2012, there will be something like 64 million more people on earth than at the beginning of the year.
At the Cairns Group meeting in Canada recently, food security was the dominant issue because it influences global security. Future wars could flare over access to land, water, food or energy. Or even the freedom to gain from their use.
There are those in the environmental movement who consider population can only be brought under control though resource limitation; in other words starvation.
We have seen in countries like Haiti, that overpopulation coupled with resource and technology limitation, leads only to environmental destruction. Perhaps those statues on Easter Island are the oldest warnings underscoring this point.
It is quite clear that economic prosperity and the increased certainty for survival that prosperity brings, are key drivers for smaller families and population control.
Market demand
The second global issue is that, as families reduce in size, children become more precious to their parents who become more risk adverse.
They want safe food for their children and life prolonging products for themselves.
The environment
Third, there is a concern, in the first world at least, for the environment. This is manifested in numerous forms the most notable being organic foods, opposition to genetic modification and climate change.
Locally, the pressure on our waterways and biodiversity is a concern for many.
Land
Fourth, while the population expands we are not making any more land.
The number of hectares available for food production per person has steadily dropped from 0.44 hectares in 1960 to 0.26 hectares in 1999.
By the time world population is expected to peak at 9-10 billion in 2050, the number of hectares available per person is predicted to be 0.15.
The green revolution of the 1960s, with the use of pesticides, fertiliser and new hybrid seeds, gave us a quantum lift in production.
These were not New Zealand inventions but New Zealand farmers and scientists adopted and adapted them to maintain our agricultural leadership. It is obvious that the world needs new technologies to make similar quantum leaps.
The competition
Fifth, New Zealand also exists in a competitive market.
The developing sophistication of agriculture, in places like South America, is a competitive threat.
The rapid deployment of genetic modification around the world is eroding our competitiveness through increased productivity and reduced environmental impact.
Location
Finally, we live in a globalised world.
Technology allows the ready movement of people, capital and ideas across borders.
Physical technology companies can be based anywhere there is a skilled labour force, sufficient energy and capital. Technology, in the physical sense, is fast moving and highly mobile.
Out of the top 10 technology kiwi high fliers, Fisher and Paykel Appliances, Fisher and Paykel Healthcare and Rakon have moved significant manufacturing offshore.
Of “NZ's technology top 20”, Fisher & Paykel Appliances is partially overseas owned, Navman is partially Kiwi owned while Nextwindow is no longer New Zealand owned at all. Allied Telesis is a Japanese company.
By contrast, the global population growth curve demands solutions from those economies with the vital resources of water, land and people.
In that respect, New Zealand’s geopolitical position and economic profile, makes it attractive in a resource hungry world. There is major scope to develop highly profitable companion industries off our primary base. To ensure our research efforts make a difference we need to have an appropriate research spend and an effective science system with the right incentives.
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Dr William Rolleston is a South Canterbury farmer and founding shareholder and director of South Pacific Sera. The current Federated Farmers South Canterbury provincial president and current Vice President of the national organisation. Dr Rolleston also chairs the Ministry of Science and Innovation's Innovation Board.
3 Comments
William is more right than maybe he realises himself, New Zealand is not a technological country, and it never will be, it is a beancounter country. The productive people are just people as the farmers. New Zealand completely lacks the culture of hi-tech development and the marketing of the same.
However, there is one small element that is missing here in William’s paper. The world will never beat a track to New Zealand to buy anything, never mind what New Zealand has to offer, New Zealand just has to go out and sell it, and it must be done on grassroots level on the terms of the market. No need for these NZTE or Tourism New Zealand grandiose schemes, which all seems to boil down to finding someone else that takes the risk and do the dog work.
I see of course China as I lived here almost all my life and New Zealand is not well seen or regarded in China. Arrogant, supremacist, highhanded, even racist and corrupt. I know Kiwis don’t agree, but they have no say in how they are judged by others.
That does not prevent Kiwis from selling their products in China, business and money has no colour. The point is, they must get off the couch and do it. Nobody will come and break down the door to hand out easy money.
The people who can and are able to do it must be Kiwis who understand the market, not those who look PC (Politically Correct) as of New Zealand consultants or beancounter managers. Tragically, those Kiwis are now largely Expat Kiwis to a very large degree, you find many in the KEA (Kiwi Expat Association). I hear that 40% of the internationally competent Kiwi population has already fled the country.
They will not come and hand in CV and applications to Kiwi companies or middle men consultants, just to be personally insulted and belittled by aptitude test, evaluation procedures, and one sided interrogations called “interviews”, treated like they were melons in a shop and the buyer tried to find the best one by going around and squeezing, they are already headhunted internationally, and sought after prey. In China, you even get stopped on the streets and asked it you are interested in a job.
Instead of throwing millions at failed organisations, failed in China, as NZTE like it was a pagan god, engage these expat kiwis to work for New Zealand, to sell New Zealand products. Everything is already in place, all you have to do is go out and sell, and the industry grow of itself.
If a China competent Kiwi has been running the show in China, the Fonterra disaster would never had happened, and I know for a fact that Fonterra had the opportunity to do just that, but the person was rejected, people who did not know what they were doing was put on the job, and know the result.
All the competent people in my family have left NZ. I have left, although my competency is in serious doubt, just ask the wife! NZ has to tap into this diaspora and reward well those who go out to bat for the country. You say NZ is seen by outsiders as
"Arrogant, supremacist, highhanded, even racist and corrupt"
Unfortunately that is a fair assessment. I would also add to the list, complacent and having a deluded sense of self worth. NZer's like to think their brightest and best will return. Every day they are away makes that less likely. My academically very successful son is now in Taiwan on a scholarship studying Mandarin as hard as he can go and thinks he will likely stay there as he really likes the country and people.
Still we should mention that as far as I have experienced, most of these Expat Kiwis are still Kiwis at heart, and they would love to work for New Zealand, the problem is that New Zealand does not want them. New Zealand rather sends out some mates on a 2 years vacation to China.
I went to Chongqing I western China earlier this year, one of the three kiwis I heard about there can communicate in seven languages, and he translates from written Chinese to English and other languages, he is a qualified engineer and lawyer, and very experienced marketeer. He tried to get jobs for New Zealand companies, but they don’t want him. Another Kiwi there is completely fluent in the local Chinese language, to the degree that he prefers it over his native English. He has been there for nearly 20 years. This region expands 17% annually and is crying out for foreign products. New Zealand is absent.
In countries as Holland, Sweden, or Switzerland, 100% of the population over 18 speaks at least one foreign language fluently, and about 80% a second foreign language. It is normal to be able to communicate in three or four languages.
What about the decision makers in New Zealand, if I read the news media right, they can hardly speak their own language, let alone understanding and have any ability or experience to work in a foreign environment, or to select the right people to do the job.
What can we do about it?
Can Interst.co.nz help?
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