Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says he is pressing on with attempts to qet agreement with farmers on putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions, but he admits this process is proving very difficult.
And progress might have to wait til after the election.
Hipkins' comments come as hopes falter that the farming sector's flagship document He Waka Eka Noa (HWEN) will survive as a blueprint for a low emissions agricultural future.
HWEN is the farming lobby's attempt to reduce emissions at the farmer level. The Government has previously said this is an alternative to putting the entire agricultural sector into the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
But it has retained the ETS as a "backstop", or alternatively, as a deterrent which would dissuade farmers from doing nothing.
Time is running short between now and the election, to achieve progress.
But Hipkins is undeterred.
"We are pressing on to work with the farming community to put a price on greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.
"We continue to have good, robust conversations about that. It has always been a very challenging area, anyone who reads the news coverage of that knows that this is not an uncontroversial area."
Hipkins insists he wants to work with the farmers, and says the election need not change that.
"We will continue to maintain the backstop (compulsory use of the ETS) after 2025," he says.
"But of course there is plenty of time to run after the election.....to find a solution."
But this option might not be available to Hipkins, as National could win the next election and come to the table with a different set of proposals.
"We will have more to say in the next few weeks about agriculture," National leader Christopher Luxon told reporters.
He says he wants to work with the farming sector but says the opportunity has been lost because the Government has messed up the process.
"We supported an industry-led solution. That got blown apart when the government over-reached and decided to kill off one fifth of our sheep and beef farmers in seven years, and that has caused huge disruption and loss of confidence."
The details of National's forthcoming announcement are being kept under wraps, and Luxon will not say if it will retain some or all of HWEN.
"I will have more to say on that in a couple of weeks."
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