Growers fear fuel tax

A carbon tax on greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels such as coal will be another nail in the coffin for horticulturists heating glasshouses, says a Marlborough tomato-grower.

"I'm not going to say it will kill us but it is just another pressure, and if it goes forward in the way it is proposed at the moment, it will be relatively bleak," said Peter Blackmore.

From 2007, the Government will probably impose a carbon charge on coal, gas, electricity, oil, diesel and petrol to meet New Zealand's obligations under the Kyoto Protocol.

The tax is expected to hurt businesses using fossil fuels or electricity generated from fossil fuels in their industrial heating.

A study by the Vegetable Growers Federation, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Energy Efficiency Conservation Authority found the tax would seriously hit growers using glasshouses heated with coal, gas or oil.

An average-sized business would have to pay $10,500 a year, with the biggest operators facing bills of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Blackmore said the greenhouse growing industry in Marlborough had suffered under competition from Australian imports and Auckland corporate horticultural organisations.

"Both of these will bear the brunt of this less than us.

"It will hit coal users very hard," he said.

"It puts us at a disadvantage with our main competition, and as far as the Australian ones go, it is a joke."

Blackmore said the greenhouse industry, particularly in the South Island, was not buoyant at the moment and the tax would be another nail in the coffin if it went ahead in its proposed form.

Vegfed executive officer Ken Robertson said South Island growers did not really have a viable alternative to coal as gas was not available and electricity was too scarce and expensive.

"The South Island people will come under more pressure more quickly ... They will really feel it hard."

In the late 1960s there were more than 30 greenhouse operators in Marlborough. Now there are three, including niche market grower Steffan Browning.

Last year he paid a self-imposed carbon tax of $10 a tonne for the coal used to heat his greenhouses.

That money went to Marlborough Forest and Bird for buying and planting native trees.

But Browning indicated at a field day this year that with increasing coal prices it would be difficult to sustain that level of payment.

He is currently overseas and unavailable for comment.

- NZPA