Guest view: Bay of Plenty's growth impacting food security

What happens when all the farmland is turned to housing? Photo / file

There is a fine art to planning.

You do not leave it to the last minute when you're tired, irritable and more than likely going to disturb someone else's good mood.

All of the above is just good sense.

So why is it that in 2018, with all the advances in education and science, it falls to me to have to warn urban planners in the Bay of Plenty area that where they are proposing to place our projected population growth is right on top of fertile land.

Do they not like having food security? We are going to go the same way as Pukekohe if we are not careful – having to battle to put the importance of being able to feed ourselves at the forefront of some university leaver, with little to no life experience, policy adviser's mind.

Should New Zealand farmers ditch their boots, lock the farm gate and take up IT jobs in the cities? Our supermarkets can be filled with food produced overseas under regulations we have no control over and then we can be charged whatever overseas suppliers want. Should we just get out of trade altogether? Is that the plan?

Council planners have to start dealing in reality and not their ideal idea of massive yards for their urban areas. They are going to have to start investing in well-constructed, environmentally friendly apartments. And they have to be well constructed – none of this leaky homes debacle that hit urban areas years ago because of poor decision-making processes.

The Government must also step up and start protecting fertile land areas from urban sprawl. We are a country very much built and maintained in the primary sector. Any attack on our fertile food growing soils is an attack on our means of survival as a country.