High standards vital for ag fliers

02-08-2010 | Tim Fulton

Hard-pressed agriculture aviators are being told they need to become accredited to win support from environmentalists and regulators.

New Zealand Agricultural Aviation Association chairman Tony Michelle told members at the annual conference in Palmerson North last week that the NZ Forest Owners group is aiming for a formal understanding with the Animal Health Board on aerial 1080 and other operations on their land.

A "heads up" letter to NZAAA from the foresters says "We hope to build in provisions to allow for drug and alcohol testing of all AHB contractors operating on (or over) our land, including random testing.

"This would likely include pilots and ground crews."

The forest owners believed the steps were necessary because of their obligation under health and safety and employment law to take "all practicable steps" to capture contractors under a code of conduct.

Michelle, who runs a helicopter contracting business at Hanmer Springs, North Canterbury, read out extracts of the forest owners'letter to highlight the need for more ag aviators to take up the sector's voluntary accreditation process.

He stressed to delegates that while the forest owners' request was

only one reason for being accredited, it was indicative of pressure for ag aviators to lift standards across the industry.

Ag aviators had done plenty of talking about accreditation, Michelle said, but it was time to act.

Perhaps not by accident Landcorp's national business manager Graeme Mulligan highlighted the state-owned farmer's position as a speaker at

the same conference.

Five of Lancdcorp's 12 contractors are not accredited but from June

30 next year the country's biggest farmer will contract only

accredited operators.

The SOE's stance appears to be designed to head off the sort of

headline-grabbing criticism that Michelle quoted to colleagues.

At one point he read a recent press release from the Soil and Health Association criticising a controversial 1080 drop in Taranaki and calling for a "national ban" on aerial spraying following community concerns about contracting at Bethell's Beach, west of Auckland.

"NZ is a poisoners' paradise with little restriction against broad scale herbicide spraying on agricultural, forestry, amenity and conservation land or of palletised animals poisons being dropped over huge areas," Organic NZ spokesperson Steffan Browning claimed earlier this year.

Michelle, mindful that even the most wrong-headed information can have an impact, was only partly dismissive of the press release.

"We are all aware of the ensuing media frenzy and the misinformation that went along with this (statement) - however, mud sticks."

He also made it clear that such criticism was not just the preserve of the ultra-greens.

Aerial application of pesticides was the topic of an OECD Pesticide Risk Reduction Seminar in 2009, Michelle noted.

One recommendation was to develop a short OECD code of best and good practices for aerial application.

At the OECD's latest "risk reduction steering meeting" NZ was one of the members invited to provide their country's national standards for aerial application.

Accordingly, the steering group was provided with the National Certificate in Aerial Application of Agrichemicals in NZ.

Michelle made it clear to the NZAAA conference that he would have loved to have been able to assure that all of his industry was also accredited. As it stands, only a minority of operators have that status.

Michelle accepted the scheme had been hindered by a lack of acceptance from local government. The industry launched the certification scheme 12 years ago but accreditation hasn't beenadopted in a single district or regional plan.

A typical stumbling block was newly qualified policy staff responsible moving on to other jobs before learning anything useful about how ag aviation works.

Consequently, many councils had "poor institutional knowledge" of agriculture resulting in reactive, ill conceived policy.

The NZAAA had tried to bridge a lack of understanding about the industry's role in agriculture by asking councils to insert reference documents into their plans. Unfortunately councils had displayed an "historical lack of enthusiasm" for this.

Blame shouldn't be all laid at a council's door, however.

It was understandable for ag aviators not to become accredited when there was no regulatory requirement and a lack of sanctions - for the meantime at least - from overseas markets and law-makers.

Marketing of accreditation might also need an overhaul because some operators had come to believe that the certification was sure to give them an advantage over competitors.

While that might happen sometimes the scheme was actually aimed at better environmental and safety standards.

Michelle said accreditation needed recognisable branding so the concept could be easily understood by operators, councils and the general public.

Besides possibly benefitting from a catchy new name, accreditation had to also remain transparent, independently audited "and take account of customer expectations, both in NZ and overseas.

In this context it was important for ag aviators to be keenly aware of demands for safe food in keeping with "gate to plate" marketing philosophies.

"It's now time as an industry for us to walk the talk", Michelle told his colleagues at one point.

A few moments later he put the comment more precisely.

"It is vital that the majority of us become accredited if we want to make a credible case to the regulators."

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