The Voluntary Bonding Scheme for Veterinarians was launched in 2009 to help ease a shortage of vets working with production animals and working dogs in rural New Zealand.
Scheme recipients each receive $55,000 before tax across five years, in return for working in rural New Zealand.
To be eligible for the Ministry for Primary Industries scheme, graduates must be a New Zealand citizen or permanent resident and hold a Massey University bachelor of veterinary science degree.
Veterinary Centre Oamaru co-director Mat O’Sullivan said international vets students studying at Massey spent five years learning about New Zealand farm systems and training on them.
International students graduating and taking the knowledge offshore was a missed opportunity, he said.
He wanted the scheme opened up to all vets graduating in New Zealand and Australia, as the education provided on both sides of the Ditch were similar, he said.
His clinic employed two young Australian vets in August last year.
"They are awesome."
The Aussie vets, Ali Bulle and Angus Pilmore, were a couple and graduated from a vet school in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, in July last year, Mr O’Sullivan said.
"They arrived for calving and were straight into it," Mr O’Sullivan said.
He believed they should be eligible for the scheme, as it could be enough of an incentive to get more vets working in rural New Zealand and stay in the job for longer.
If an international graduate vet was incentivised to work for years in a rural area in New Zealand, they would be more likely to settle down there, Mr O’Sullivan said.
"They might buy some real estate or meet a local girl or boy and become entrenched in the community and you can keep them on."
New Zealand Veterinary Association Te Pae Kīrehe chief executive Kevin Bryant said the association would support a review of the scheme’s eligibility of international graduates of Massey University.
Provided all required criteria were met, registered veterinarians living in New Zealand could apply for a Straight to Residence Visa.
"Therefore, opportunities may exist to open the scheme to international graduates from Massey University once they have gained residency, permanent residency, or citizenship within three years of entering the scheme to be eligible for the first allotment of the bonding scheme."
The association would support further investigation of those opportunities as part of a review process, he said.
When asked if he supported a review of the scheme, a spokeswoman for Agriculture Minister Todd McClay said the question should be put to the immigration minister as the rationale for only offering the scheme to residents was reasonably straightforward.
"The scheme bonds graduate vets to a rural practice. Most international students can’t be bonded as they don’t have the right to work in New Zealand," the spokeswoman said.
A spokesman for Immigration Minister Erica Stanford said this was not something the minister would comment on.
MPI agriculture investment services operations director Cheyne Gillooly said an independent review of the scheme was conducted in 2019.
The review identified that the financial contribution to graduate’s student loans, which the scheme provides, was an attractive incentive for them remaining in the sector.
This incentive would be different for international students.
In recent years, the scheme had been oversubscribed from the 30 places available.
MPI accepted all 35 applicants in 2024. Opening the scheme to international students would increase competition for the limited places available."
