The Ministry for Primary Industries' new director-general says he's confident a review process will leave it better prepared to deal with food safety and compliance issues such as last year's botulism alert.
Martyn Dunne, who took up the job late last year, has told Federated Farmers' dairy council that the ministry is not in for another bout of restructuring but is going through what he calls a process of alignment.
He says he's confident it will come out of that much stronger and more able to deal with the issues it needs to.
Mr Dunne says that since he joined MPI he has had to spend a disproportionate amount of time dealing with issues such as dairy product recalls, apples in China and meat trade problems.
He says that's distracting the ministry from preparing for the big changes under way in the primary sector.