UK must follow New Zealand in treating farming as an engine for economic growth

I hardly dare think what carnage might ensue if our own Keir Starmer were to turn up at Ingliston next week and try the same thing at the Highland Show.

Luxton spent the day at Field Days – think Highland Show without animals crossed with the Oxford Farming Conference – working the field, dressed in jeans and jumper, comfortable in putting his case. Farming unions of course want more but the debate starts from a position where people know that their industry matters and that broadly the government is on their side.

Agriculture accounts for more approximately fifteen per cent of New Zealand’s GDP, compared to the less than one per cent of the United Kingdom’s. You see the importance of food production before you have even reached passport control.

In flight videos warn you of on the spot fines that will hit you if you try to take any food stuffs into the country in your luggage. The message is reinforced by large posters and brightly coloured bins for contraband to be binned before your luggage is screened entering the country.

This is a country that takes biosecurity at the border seriously because it has something to lose if it were to be hit by invasive pests or diseases such as foot and mouth disease.

Contrast that with the occasional A4 poster you might see at UK airports warning you that we too have banned personal imports of food stuffs.

While British farmers fret about our market being flooded with imports both this government and its predecessor have opened the door with a series of Free Trade Agreements. The deals with Australia and New Zealand were amongst the most radical in opening the door. New Zealand has long standing lamb quotas for export to the UK which it does not meet but has already met its growing beef quota each year and, as one minister to whom I spoke put it, they are going to be “over there to sell baby sell”.

Farming is also seen as an engine for wider economic growth for Kiwis. Agri business giant, Gallagher NZ used the show to announce impressive growth in turnover and profit. For those of us who have long argued our government’s mission for economic growth needs to go beyond the city of London, here is the proof point.

Of course in a globalised economy even the Kiwis are vulnerable to global shocks so New Zealand farmers are feeling the impact of events in the Gulf pushing up prices of fuel and fertiliser. The difference is in the response of their government. In contrast to the impotent handwringing in London the New Zealand government were booking plane tickets to Singapore where they cut a deal with the government to guarantee fuel supplies in return for them selling food. It is what you do when farming and food security matter to you in the practical and not just the theoretical sense.

Alistair Carmichael is Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland