Lavender Grower Fears Costs Last Straw
Nelson Lakes lavender grower Preston Shaw fears crippling compliance costs imposed by an Australian-based regulator of herbal remedies could force him out of business.
Mr Shaw joined about 50 other protesters on a march through Nelson on Saturday in opposition to the Therapuetic Products and Medicines Bill before a select committee.
If passed the bill would set up a new regulatory regime for alternative health products, medicines and medical devices.
Mr Preston said he had about 30 products on the market, which he sold through tourist outlets, retails shops and at the Nelson Market every Saturday morning. He had struggled to find out how the legislation could affect his operation, he said.
“What I do know about the bill is if it’s passed it will require me to have a manufacturing license and probably to submit a large number of my products for testing. The cost will be on myself and as a result of that I will go out of business.” “No one has ever shown in New Zealand that anybody has suffered either death or potential harm from herbal remedies, and everybody knows, we read regularly in the paper, about the deaths that occur in our hospitals and due to pharmaceutical medicines.”
Green MP Sue Kedgley joined the march, and told protesters that unlike pharmaceutical medicines, herbal and therapeutic products had been used for centuries without any known adverse effect.
“So why on earth is our Government seeking to restrict these health-giving products?”
The main risk these products posed was to the profits of pharmaceutical companies, she said.
“If this bill goes through, and I hope that with your help it won’t, many many products that we see on our shelves will disappear from our health food stores.”
A 2003 survey revealed there were 700 ingredients permitted in New Zealand that were not allowed in Australia.
“Are we going to have people arrested for selling kawakawa for goodness sake? Because that’s the idiocy that confronts us.”
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