Frank Film: Have New Zealanders lost access to our own food? | nzherald.co.nz

More of this please; it's about bloody time.

as a producer it disgusts me that i can get $7.60 a kg for a lamb that would weigh 19.5kg at the works for a profit of $ 148.20 and that same lamb processed can sell in a supermarket for over $450. the supply chain form farmer to consumer is littered with gross profiteering.

did not expect this from mainstream media good work keep it up

I remember when I was a kid in the 80s, my mum commenting that NZ exports all its food and Kiwis were having to subsidise it by paying more for a block of NZ cheese than it was sold for overseas. It has never been acceptable, nor sensible. In the early 80s, Japanese and Russians were already fishing our seas bare, and trawling tearing up the ocean bottoms and destroying fish habitat was becoming a public concern. When I was a kid I could sit on the wharf, fish for a couple of hours, and fill my bucket up with fish. You could see the fish swimming around the wharf posts and people would swim in the water and chase them. By the mid-nineties, a kid fishing off the same wharf could sit there all day and not catch a thing...and not a single fish under the wharf. NZ has not looked after its land, water, and food resources. This has got to change. We have seen the effects of climate change; there's a storm coming and we have to shore up our food security as part of preparing for it.

So come on NZ govt, due diligence, return our home grown nutrition to us. The fact that we hospitalize children with malnutrition is FRANKLY shameful

couldn't agree more with the last comment. We have it the wrong way around in NZ. Feed kiwis 1st, make it cheaper Then export

The price of fish at the supermarkets is a cruel joke, the price of meat is evil, Chicken is now unaffordable for most of our people. I love NZ, but come on Gov,do something for your people and leave the identity politics in the bin where it belongs.

eating fresh healthy food has become a luxury in New Zealand.

I remember a few years back that a Maori man with prior convictions was arrested for fishing without a license so he could feed his family. At the time - a group of young white teens in Auckland were caught after a house robbing spree, stealing over 80k worth of possessions just for the “thrill of it". Guess who got locked up..

Absolutely! Been saying it for years! Unfortunately successive govts keep the same old system of selling everything overseas to the detriment of its own people. If people of Aotearoa had access to fresh food markets in all the towns and cities, there would not be the obesity, heart disease, diabetes which fill up our GP clinics and hospital beds meaning those who need emergency or long term treatment and surgery are suffering intolerably. Which political party is going to make the change?????

When we sailed through Fjordland we were told by cray fisherman that their catch would be collected by mutiple helicopter trips and sent to China. The fisherman cruelly hold the crays in caches ( by size), waiting for market prices to peak and then quickly ship them out. The smaller, lesser quality crays are sold in NZ.

I first visited NZ 25 years ago from the UK and couldn't believe that things like NZ lamb, butter and wine were CHEAPER in England than here! The global financial and food systems are well and truly broken, instead of pushing for a cashless new world order where some overseas entity dictates what we do, we should be forcing independence and looking after ourselves. Charity begins at home.

Brilliant work. I'm in Australia and our dairy farmers are struggling whilst the cheap dairy products in supermarkets are from New Zealand. That's absurd. I just finished listening to Ultra-Processed People by Chris van Tulleken and we have to make our governments do better

Amazing report! So reasonable, so thoughtful, everything just makes sense. I hope it can strum the chords of public opinion in New Zealand.

I believe the same problem exists in Australia. It used to be cheaper to buy ingredients and make your own healthy food, but not anymore. The systems need to change, but they won't. European farms are being shut down or destocked, which can only mean that NZ and Australia will continue to be the food bowl for those who will never have to go without, so exports will continue. Long live the farmers market...until they stop them too.

It's not just food it's banks' railways power companies, and everything the country don't want new zealand to be self sufficient and we were one of the only country's in the world capable of being able to make it work with out ever worrying about any help from any other country in the world.

When i realised i could get a nicer cut of NZ lamb.. better butter and cheese, in Aussie for way cheaper...... it shook me. HOW did we let this happen.?! NZers deserve better!!!

"Change the system!!" So true, so sad, all real. Also so positive. Ultimately, a great Film. Thank you for posting.

Dear god please keep publishing these articles. These are the things that matter.

this has to be a top priority for New Zealand. ka pai! Keep it local. It happens in New York but not here?