cadmium

Found this on MAF's website while trawling for other stuff. Hopefully MAK's in-house Kiwi is chatting to the relevant Gov't bods here in N'Zillind

(Taken from http://www.maf.govt.nz/mafnet/rural-nz/sustainable-resource-use/land-management/cadmium-in-nz/report-one/page-07.htm)

An emerging issue and a need for strategic management

Overall, cadmium accumulation in soils does not pose an immediate or severe risk to New Zealand agriculture and food safety in the immediate future. There may be risks to land-use flexibility in some regions.

However, cadmium accumulation in agricultural soils can be characterised as an emerging issue, which therefore needs strategic management to prevent it from becoming a more serious and acute problem in the future. Given that current economics are driving a trend towards agricultural intensification, particularly towards dairy, it is reasonable to assume that the use of increased rates of phosphate fertilisers will continue. Unless a cost effective process for removing cadmium from phosphate rock is developed, this is likely to lead to continuing accumulation of cadmium in agricultural soils, raising the risk of breaches of food safety standards in food crops grown on those soils and in animal offal. Similarly, the demand for housing and urban expansion means that residential subdivisions are likely to continue to expand over former agricultural lands, creating the potential for soil cadmium to emerge as an impediment to subdivision.

Cadmium accumulation is an ongoing issue that is not going to go away. It is prudent to develop a strategy to managing the risks before they occur.