Relevance of the One World, One Health framework to farming in Aotearoa NZ – a perspective piece

This report is a perspective piece that suggests one possible approach for monitoring and assurance of regenerative agriculture in New Zealand. The approach is based on the successful ‘One Health’ framework, a collaborative international framework that brings together health science disciplines.

A One Health approach reflecting the interconnection of our ecosystem, human health, animal health, and other factors including biodiversity and environment enables risk to our ecosystem and our connected lives to be assessed and appropriate responses actioned. This approach makes sense in New Zealand, given the country’s relatively isolated island ecosystem and existing Indigenous Māori world view and knowledge system that emphasises holism and interconnectivity between humans, animals, and the environment. Previous agricultural policy has not taken such a holistic view and has resulted in agricultural intensification. Our eco-systems are now more fragile and require novel leadership on how to adapt with agility to a changing world of increasing disease threat, new regulations, and amplified scrutiny. We need future farm systems that meet these needs. This must be underpinned by evidence-based One Health research that informs, guides, and protects public health and well-being, our natural world, and the life-support capacity it provides.