Wellington Nov 25 NZPA - Turners and Growers chairman Tony Gibbs says he rejects as "hysterical" concerns that his company has "colluded" with foreign powers in its bid to break Zespri International's control of exports outside Australasia.

He also questioned comments from Trade Minister Tim Groser that the row is a "commercial dispute dressed up in policy terms".

"I can't understand why a Minister who purports to be a champion of free trade would say that, unless it's an attempt to avoid the real issues," said Mr Gibbs.

Zespri International gained single desk exporting status in 1999 when the kiwifruit industry was restructured under legislation sought by growers. Before then, exporters were undercutting each other in overseas markets, and growers voted to regulate the exports.

Mr Gibbs has since claimed those reforms were only intended to be an interim measure, even though the then National-led government's food and fibre minister John Luxton said that a single kiwifruit marketing desk should continue "without a sunset clause".

The key issue about which Turners and Growers has complained is that only Zespri or those exporters with a collaborative contract can legally sell kiwifruit in overseas markets other than Australia.

Today Mr Gibbs said Zespri's privileged position was entirely about government policy.

Mr Groser's job was international trade issues ... "but he should not purport to be speaking for the New Zealand Government on matters of agricultural policy," said Mr Gibbs.

Agriculture Minister David Carter was actually following the policy debate, he said.

Zespri said today it did not want to get bogged down in a public debate over the letter its chief executive Lain Jager wrote to Mr Groser claiming that Turners' parent Guinness Peat Group (GPG) had been working with the US Government to get rid of the single desk.

"Zespri was concerned that the activities that had come to our attention were unhelpful to New Zealand's national interest," said Zespri spokeswoman Carol Ward. It appeared that Turners and Growers had sought to work with foreign governments.

Zespri claimed in its letter that GPG had worked with US embassy staff in Wellington, and was "seeking to collude with foreign powers to apply pressure on the New Zealand Government" over its campaign to deregulate the kiwifruit industry".

"Given the commercial and diplomatic sensitivities of these matters, it is not appropriate for us to provide more detailed public comment," Ms Ward said.

Mr Gibbs said today that Turners had "spread our information far and wide".

The United States did not take orders from his company, but was asking questions because Zespri was signing growers and packhouses up to exclusivity agreements, monopolising kiwifruit cultivars, and seeking to tie up the Australian market.

"The Government never authorised any of that," he said.

Kiwifruit orchardists and their plant breeders in state science companies have spent more than 20 years developing novel kiwifruit cultivars, starting with the Zespri "gold" fruit.

The company has just started a big new push to develop these cultivars for commercial release, with $20.5m from its growers and $15m from taxpayer-funded science investments.

And it has been paying growers "loyalty payments" since 2004 if they contract to supply only Zespri -- a move seen as insuring against further deregulation of the kiwifruit sector, and as a way to reduce the sale of top quality fruit being legally sent to Australia and then illegally re-exported.