Overview

[Video footage of attendees and representatives at the Primary Growth Partnership Expo in Wellington in October 2015.]

Hon Nathan Guy, Minister for Primary Industries: "The Expo today is fantastic. Huge amount of interest in the Primary Growth Partnership. Actually there's a lot of chatter going on right now about industry sharing ideas. That's one of the untold stories with the Primary Growth Partnership."

Dave Woods, Precision Seafood Harvesting: "It allows collaboration between otherwise competing industries on a level that we haven't seen before, and it's also given an industry lead to research and development."

Murray Brown, Alliance Group (to the left of Murray is Jonathan Wallis, Headwaters Group): "It's a great opportunity to link up government, farmer, processor. Fantastic opportunity. Can't be missed."

Collier Isaacs, FarmIQ: "Partnership. All the way. Right through the wording in the business case. Right through from, you know, 5 years ago, MPI, FarmIQ, I think we consider it to be a very very strong partnership."

Ted Culley, Sanford Limited: "The relationship's constructive, and positive about making the programme a success. I can't speak highly enough."

Hon Nathan Guy, Minister for Primary Industries: "We're talking about almost three quarters of a billion dollars that's been invested with the government and with industry partners. 20 programmes to date. Huge amount of success, whether it's Precision Seafood Harvest; whether it's mozzarella cheese; you know value-add products right through the meat sector; robotics operating in the forest sector. Numerous examples."

John Brakenridge, The New Zealand Merino Company: "The PGP initiative has enabled the New Zealand Merino Company to do all sorts of things. For a start off, it's provided us more fuel in the tank to amplify the initiatives that we were already contemplating."

Jen Scoular, Avocado Industry Council: "It's amazing actually, money talks. And we could say we've got investment from the Crown and from other avocado parties. We've got investment into this programme, and we actually can say these are the things we're going to do."

Collier Isaacs, FarmIQ: "PGP programme's been great to give us the additional capital to really stretch out the timeframe to allow you to this sort of development you could never afford to do in the normal course of business."

Hon Nathan Guy, Minister for Primary Industries: "This is about cutting-edge research. We've got to get out there and tell New Zealand public and show the world that we're serious about research and development. We're a little country down here in the South Pacific. Always punches above its weight. The reason we do that is because we invest on-farm, in industry, backed-up with the government, doing a huge amount in R&D, and that's how we're going to continue to add value for our farmers, for our foresters, for our fishers and ultimately drive sustainability."

Jeremy Hill, Fonterra: "In terms of improving the productivity and sustainability of our sector, but also in terms of the innovative products that we're going to have to produce for the future. Putting these together is why the Primary Growth Partnership programme is so important to us."

Collier Isaacs, FarmIQ: "So we've just sold the millionth retail pack in New Zealand. It's now in China and other parts of Asia, and the US, so that's moving on. We're scaling up the sale of the Farm Management System in New Zealand."

Ted Culley, Sanford Limited: "We're seeing gains potentially on a, potential gains on a 50,000 tonne type volume of around $81 million a year by 2026."

Jen Scoular, Avocado Industry Council: "The last couple of years we've doubled the value of our industry. So actually everybody is seeing those benefits and everyone's seeing how valuable it is to be part of the Primary Growth Partnership initiative for New Zealand, and we're utilising expertise of other parties in the programme as well."

[end of transcript]