95bFM Parliament faces petition to raise standards for imported animal products
7 May, 2025
Interview by Joel Armstrong, adapted by Samantha Watson-Tayler
The University of Auckland’s Marcelo Rodriguez Ferrere says legislation is needed to ensure other countries meet our animal welfare standards regarding New Zealand’s animal product imports.
A petition has reached Parliament asking for legislation to tighten New Zealand’s rules around imports of animal products.
Currently, Aotearoa imports significant animal products from countries with lower animal welfare standards, such as Spain, China, and the US.
Associate Law Professor at the University of Auckland and signatory to the petition, Marcelo Rodriguez Ferrere, told 95bFM’s The Wire that there is currently no legislation to mitigate these concerns.
“We have no controls whatsoever on the animal welfare standards that should be in place for imported goods.”
Ferrere says despite animal products being one of our biggest exports, we import much cheaper alternatives from overseas for sale to our consumers.
A report released in March this year by Animal Policy International has shown that 60% of pork available in New Zealand is exported from overseas, with 11,000 tonnes of this being imported from Spain alone in 2022.
“We export a lot of premium animal products to places around the world and import significantly cheaper alternatives, and so it makes a lot of sense for people to import products that they can get from the international market at a cheaper price,” he says.
“If you can cut corners on the lives of animals and make a few bucks over their misery, then that's not really a bargain that most New Zealanders are willing to drive.”
Ferrere says New Zealand’s free trade agreement with the UK reiterates meeting each nation’s animal welfare standards by not allowing deviation from current regulations.
He is hoping the petition will require other countries to meet New Zealand’s standards if they want to trade with us.
“New Zealand prides itself on sort of high standards and being a leader in many areas and what we think this could do is essentially sort of set [a bar for] New Zealand to meet and basically force other countries; if they want to trade with us, to lift their standards.”
