February 22, 2013
New Zealand faces biosecurity threat over import of animal feed
A report, by the Federated Farmers Grain and Seed, has raised concerns about the biosecurity risks that come with the import of about 1.5 million tonnes of pam kernel expeller (PKE), a type of animal feed, into New Zealand yearly.
The report, written by Federated Farmers Grain and Seed's vice-chairman, David Clark, and executive member, Colin MacKinnon, detailed massive biosecurity breaches during a visit to a palm-crushing plant in Malaysia in September 2012.
They presented their report to the Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI) late last year.
The farmers made the trip to assess the biosecurity risks animal feed, such as PKE imports, posed to New Zealand.