She was astounded to learn a New Zealand plant-based chicken company is importing peas from Canada because it can’t get them here.
“To hear the company can’t get peas in NZ just shows the continued disconnect we have with our end users.
“It just seems so silly to be importing peas from Canada when we can grow the very product in NZ,” Burke said.
“More needs to be done in a marketing space.”
Burke appealed to merchants and levy organisations to further promote and seek new markets for NZ-grown product.
She said the peas in question were Canadian yellow peas.
“We should be proactive and actively seeking to be the local supplier but the contracts need to be available.
“Essentially, we need a whole bunch of NZ yellow marrowfat peas. As growers we can grow them. We just need to be linked to it.”
Burke noted the increasing hype on plant-based meat substitutes.
“I wonder where NZ arable farmers fit the picture – well it appears we don’t and we won’t if we don’t make it happen.
“By its very nature we are in a fragmented industry.
“We need to get some cohesion going for the arable sector so we can all have a bigger piece of a much bigger pie.”
Burke said to grow quality products is one thing but NZ also needs to grow what the domestic market wants and push the virtue of the quality of NZ-grown products.
While it’s heartening to have Countdown supermarkets committed to using only NZ-grown grain in its in-store baking products at supermarkets across the country it is just the beginning of what should be a lot more.
“This is fantastic news for consumers and grain growers and we need to push that much further.”
The other aspect of concern is just how much end-users and household consumers truly understand about the arable products they use.
“Is it actually grown in NZ or imported and how does the industry go about addressing this.
“We are right behind the pork industry and certainly relate to their drive and government acknowledgment for country of origin labelling.
“I would like to see the same for the arable industry.
“The simple thing about a bag of flour is it’s a single-ingredient product but look on the label and it’s made from imported and local ingredients or packaged in NZ and not given any country of origin for where the ingredients come from.”
The industry needs to tell its story because consumers want to know the source of their food.
From growers to merchants and marketers we all need to link better to promote all the positives related to NZ-grown seeds, grains and pulses.
“What we have is overseas-owned mills and by nature we are influenced by what’s happening globally as far as international pricing and marketing but what we have here is a unique story about safe, quality product and sadly consumers are not hearing that story from a collaborated industry.”
While individual growers might find niche markets the answer for the industry lies in getting the merchants together with growers to promote locally grown product to all end users – livestock, bakeries, mills.
“We don’t want to be in a race to the bottom. We want to push to build our industry to be a quality product of choice and move away from our traditional status as price takers.”
Federated Farmers arable industry group is researching how the wider industry can collectively promote the benefits of quality, home-grown product.
It’s also as much about capability of producing product to meet market demand.
“We are meeting with the merchants association, mills and the livestock feed industry and we are really confident about the buy-in and opportunities we are getting to meet with these parties but there’s a hell of a long way to go yet,” Burke said.
