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Sunday, July 01, 2012

NAIT: Another impost on your steak

Today marks the implementation of another tax. A new tax on your steak and every other piece of New Zealand beef. You see, all cattle beasts have to be apparently registered with the shiny new NAIT bureaucracy in Wellytown. Cheers National for yet another tax.

Cattle already get taxed at kill for animal health so the AHB can spread 1080 poison in your waterways. Collection regime is easy. Cattle leaves your property for final ride to works, gets head lopped off with any tags and taxed is applied. Any traceability of your piece of beef ends there.

And what will NAIT do? SFA in my books. I have to buy and retro fit an extra RFID capable ear tag at twice the price of normal tags, spend time logging my cattle into yet another database. A database with all its attendant security and privacy issues. Cattle beast still gets to take final ride, gets head lopped off and traceability on your steak ends. National's new tax is applied, presumably on top of AHB tax. Next the IRD will want data matching on beast numbers to see if my lifestyle block is more than a hobby farm.

Shiny new bureaucracy gets paid, consumer feels inner glow from greenwash getting fed bullsh*t about their steak being traceable back to my place. Yes, Mrs Jones in the UK is really going to enjoy that price increase on her New Zealand steak.


Register cattle on my lifestyle block? I'll continue grass polishing and worry about getting registered for NAIT when my cattle go to the works. I'll pay the $13 + Grab Snatch and Take 'too hard to handle to tag' when the cattle beasts go for the final ride.

Till then the beltway bureaucracy can bugger off and keep sending those nasty reminders via AHB full of legal action threats. They won't do anything for $13.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Cattle already get taxed at kill for animal health so the AHB can spread 1080 poison in your waterways."

Breaks down to nothing. Like bovine TB do you? Idiot.

MarkR said...

Totally agree - just another tax, another layer to add to the compliance regime. Nothing will be gained except perhaps that another beaurocrat gets to feel more important than he actually is. Traceability, yeah right.

@anonymous - nothing is mentioned about 'liking' bovine TB, just an expression of fact - 1080 does at times indeed end up in the waterways. And yes it might be very diluted in the end, but then so is effluent!