The Potential of Possums

June 2005
Bryan Bassett-Smith, CEO of Wildenz, originally hailed from the Bay of Plenty but went to the South Island for 30 years and spent much of his time leaping in and out of helicopters catching deer, and then farming them. Later he came back up this way, settled close to Tauranga, and started catching pest animals again, but this time he went for something smaller possums which he saw as a rich and renewable resource right at his doorstep. He was also motivated to do something to reduce the possum problem and make some use out them.

He found that some excellent research had been done on the fibre but little on the meat. Anecdotal evidence suggested that dogs always did well on possum, and so he got AgResearch to analyse it and found that possum meat is very high in Omega 3 and Omega 6 fatty acids with an unusually favourable ratio between them.

This ratio is unique to possum, and there are many dogs now that are eating possum pet food that have been allergic to beef or chicken, and because it is a new protein source it can cure some of these allergies and it certainly does cure many skin and coat complaints, he says.

He had been exporting exotic animals for a long time and knew about the rules and regulations involved. A draft protocol for possum meat had been prepared, and with a few amendments it became a set of rules to follow to trap possums for meat, transport them to a factory and process them.

The next step was to develop a risk management programme, which looked at the whole procedure right from where they are in the forest, the issue of poisons, and followed the animal right through to the finished product. That was quite an expensive process.

They could not trap anywhere where poisons had been used in the past four years, so he had to be diligent about where possums were taken from, but many farmers supported them and did not want poisons used on their land.

One motivation for the business was to create a new industry and give people work, and in doing so he has shown that there are alternatives to poisoning programmes. He has in some cases been at odds with agencies like DOC and the Animal Health Board, but firmly believes that the use of poisons in our forests must end otherwise it'll come back to haunt us if ever residues are found in our export produce, (and some people believe that that is inevitable).

TB in possums isn't important from the pet food point of view because the product is cooked. Poisoned possums die, but the TB bacteria dont they can survive to infect other possums and other species. However, if possums are trapped and removed any TB is removed from the area and destroyed in the cooking process.

As part of the risk management programme there is a protocol for trappers that sets out some very specific rules about where they can trap, getting landowner approval, signed declarations that they are working within the law and the protocol.

Brian and his associates will take all fur, skins and meat, and there is good money to be made, he says, some up to $75 a kilo. At times around 2000 possums per day are processed.

Part of the MAF hygiene requirements are that the possum comes to the factory with the skin on if it is to be used for meat, so carcasses can either be fully furred or plucked. Possum trappers will get about $3.50 if they pluck the fur, and about $1.50 for the carcass. If the skins are first grade they may get up to $12.

At the factory carcasses are skinned in a very controlled and clean environment and the meat is produced very hygienically, packed into 20 kilo bins and frozen. They use the whole carcass including heart, liver, lungs, and kidneys.

Possum is an expensive raw material for a pet food costing around $1.75 per kilo whereas conventional pet food is somewhere between 30 and 80 cents per kilo. However, the long term vision is to create demand for possum meat for human consumption, and Asia seems to be the big market. Unfortunately, the Chinese who were taking possum meat called it Civet cat, and that species was implicated in SARS disease outbreaks so as could be some time before that market opens again, but it will be worthwhile in the long haul.

In the meantime Wildenz is focusing on the pet food market, and having some impact on the wild population of possums.

If we don't keep having an impact on them the situation will get away on us, and we will have a lot of birds in a precarious situation being displaced by possums, says Brian.

An export market for canned product has opened in Singapore and Malaysia, where it is popular for dogs that have developed allergies to other meats of dubious quality. It is hypo-allergenic and anti-arthritic. They have sold 140 tonnes to date, and need another 40 tonnes immediately for the markets they are developing, and could sell another 140 tonnes this year.

Within New Zealand the dog sausage product is available in the Waikato, Hawkes Bay, Rotorua, Taupo and Auckland areas but at the moment the whole process is export led.

The dog roll is available in NZ, and although it seems expensive on a weight basis it is very competitive because it has a low moisture content and on a quality basis it would exceed other dog rolls. It is shelf stable and doesn't need refrigeration.

The company is keen to buy carcasses from clean areas, and a simple demonstration can show a farmers and trappers just how carcasses need to be gutted and prepared, then frozen for collection.

1080 Poison

Brian urges farmers to be cautious with poisons, and if there is a chance of the poisons getting into the domestic food chain don't use them.

The side affects are not fully known but we do know that our native bird population is diminishing, eels are harder to find and, to quote a senior MAF official, we are sitting on a time bomb with our poison use its not a matter of if we find poison residues in our traditional livestock, its when. Traces found in laboratory tests they could ruin exports for New Zealand.

He believes there needs to be a revolution in pest control instead of poisons, use task forces of people to hit areas hard using multiple catch traps, also traps to capture ferrets, stoats and rats. Money that is presently used for poisoning should be reallocated to creating these task forces and helicopter time made available to fly people in and product out of the forests.

The possum is an asset. It has taken no money to produce, unlike our traditional farmed export produce. So with careful planning and co-operation with DOC and AHB we should as responsible caretakers of this land be harvesting this asset. It produces fur, meat, skins and we're working on pharmaceuticals from the possum. All these products are further processed in New Zealand creating jobs, the products are then exported creating export earnings.