It has been widely reported 20 per cent of China's arable land has been polluted, mainly by water sources made toxic by waste dumped from industrial locations.

The Chinese Government has issued warnings food will have to be imported due to the consequential shortfall of home-grown products.

Will this open up a new market to the high-spenders, already dominating the real estate splurge, to buy up/lease hefty tracts of land to feed the folks at home? Will this benefit New Zealanders?

Incidentally, this new scourge is not necessarily confined to ground crops, as there are numerous land-based fish farms throughout China and the water that services these is probably of the same quality.

Much of their product is canned and it's to be hoped our Agricultural guys are aware of this possibility.

F Smead,
Mount Maunganui.