by frog
Yesterday I accompanied Russel to the Horizons Regional Council hearings on the water quality section of their proposed One Plan .
Horizons, who manage natural resources in the Manawatu and Whanganui region, have proposed a really innovative way of dealing with complex issues around water, land use, heritage, biodiversity, coasts, and air quality – stick everything in the same plan, consult widely and come up with something that works.
The chapter on water quality is particularly ground-breaking. It says, quite simply, that water in rivers has to meet water quality standards, set at a level that maintains the values of that river. If those standards are not met, then a management plan is put in place to clean up the river. If a water body does meet the required standards, great, but that quality needs to be maintained or enhanced.
It sounds simple, doesn’t it? But that is the opposite approach to all other major attempts to clean up the mess that intensive dairying has left in our waterways. The Clean Streams Accord encourages farmers to fence and plant their waterways, and measures the very slow progress in that direction as success, even though nutrient and faecal contamination of our rivers is worsening. The latest snapshot of compliance is due out in a week or so and I am not expecting good news.
Unsurprisingly, the Feds are running scared.
Yesterday and today our friends Fish & Game and Forest & Bird are appearing before the commissioners to speak to their submissions and present their expert witnesses. Hearing Fish & Game staff, independent scientists and local anglers document the degradation of the streams and rivers of the Manawatu / Whanganui region over the last 15 years was fascinating and sobering. Several anglers spoke from the heart about the wild stretches of rivers they fished in as boys, most of which are now filled with sediment and algae rather than fish.
One angler said that his favourite stream used to be a little piece of wilderness down the road, somewhere nearby to experience peace and quiet and connect with nature. He stressed how important that is for local people who don’t have the time or money to travel long distances, that we are losing these opportunities to access wilderness and that we are worse off for it. I couldn’t have put it better myself.
The commissioners are giving Fish & Game a hard time because they don’t want to listen to their compelling evidence. Kia kaha you guys, and all the other community groups and individuals working hard to restore the health of the Manawatu and the other special rivers in the region. You are doing an awesome job, and we are right behind you.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by frog on Thu, March 4th, 2010
Tags: Clean Streams Accord, environment, manawatu river, one plan, Russel Norman, water
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
It sounded like something from science fiction, the talk of ‘Water Wars’,
but we’re already seeing the opening volleys of the battle for water here,
and it won’t be long until our region is fully involved.
The rivers of Canterbury are under the gun right now, firmly in the sights
of farmers who want the water for irrigation, and of the National
Government that wants to give it to them, against the wishes of other
Cantabrians: the fishers, paddlers, swimmers and picnickers; ordinary New
Zealanders who enjoy rivers just as they are; un-dammed, un-straightened
and un-tamed.
That the Government has threatened to dismiss the democratically-elected
board of the Canterbury regional council and replace them with their own
hand-picked officials, should set alarm-bells ringing. The council’s
crime? Saying ’slow down’, even, ’no’ to the farmers and industrialists
who are making repeated and insistent claims for their ‘right‘ to take
water out of the Canterbury rivers. The chairman of Southland’s regional
council is right to feel anxious. It could happen here.
Of great concern is the recent statement by John Key, supporting the claim
long pushed by Federated Farmers , that water flowing out to sea in it’s
untouched state is ‘wasted’. New Zealanders who aren’t looking to ’make a
buck’ from every natural resource, from the minerals in our national parks
to the fresh water in our rivers, know that it isn’t true. Water doesn’t
have to pass through a cow-shed or coal-to-diesel factory to give it
‘value’.
Councils that are charged with the management of water resources for their
region must listen to a wider audience than farmers and representatives of
industries like coal mining and milk processing.
Those rivers do not belong to them, they are shared resources with values
other than the dollar.
Does anyone really believe that an expanding milk processing industry at
Edendale, a massive coal mine and processing plant at Mataura and a
rapidly expanding and intensifying dairy industry, won’t require
considerably more water than is presently taken from the ground and the
rivers of the area?
I doubt anyone could accept that the new demands will be anything but heavy.
The water resource is already fully allocated, according to the officials
that measure and monitor ground water and river flow levels. It would take
a miracle for more water to become available and that isn’t going to
happen.
Here’s what might.
The council will bend and change the rules around protections on the
rivers and on groundwater, to the detriment of ordinary Southlanders who
enjoy those rivers for recreation and rely on the groundwater for
drinking.
Or, the same council will risk it’s own destruction by putting its foot
down and saying ‘no’ to expanding industry and farming. They may well then
attract the wrath of the Government, as Canterbury has found, and have a
very large foot, clad in a boot, fashioned by farming and industry and
worn by a Government that puts Economy well above Environment, come down
upon them.
It doesn’t sound like Democracy, because it’s not.
Our regional council needs the support of Southlanders to make the right
decisions over how to share the region’s water fairly just as the
Government needs to be reminded that they are there because we elected
them to the role to serve us.
If we don’t pay attention and speak up, someone else will call the shots.
And in a war, even one fought in boardrooms over water, those decide who
wins and who loses.
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Idiot/Savant is hot on this trail (are we?)
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2010/03/some-compromise.html
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Tumeke points to this>
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/agribusiness/3402049/Dairy-farmer-appeals-ECans-restrictions
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The Ecan ‘compromise’.
Deputy chairwoman Jo Kane acknowledged the compromise would effectively remove Canterbury ratepayers’ ability to have a democratic say in water issues.
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Thanks for posting that article, ‘fly, it’s good to see that regional media are supporting the river users of Southland, Otago & South Canterbury.
Ecan sounds like it has the kind of messy ‘conflicts-of-interest’ over water rights that our local council has over property speculators’ rights.
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Idiot/Savant is really giving it to them. How about this:
Go for it, I/S.
Problem is, the way that Hide and Carter lean, the good Ecan Councilors who act with propriety and in the interests of the environment (rather than those of themselves and their mates) could also be taken down by the actions of scumbags like Oldfield, and a Commissioner (who will no doubt be pro-dairy industry and anti-environment) appointed to replace Ecan.
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Irrigation is like taxes. Once you’ve climbed into it, you never normally give it up.
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“The recommendations are radical and caution and wariness are required.
They do away with an elected local authority (although elected representatives on the authority could be considered in three to five years’ time) and concentrate more power in central government’s hands.
They split water from land and air, those other essential environmental ingredients, and they are a model that might be applied to other parts of the country.”
ODT Editorial (ODT Online)
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Water woes go to Govt
CENTRAL OTAGO District mayor Malcolm McPherson said the Government was sympathetic to the future irrigation needs of the drought-prone region.
“The minister has agreed to get back to us as soon as he can. He understands our case and he is sympathetic, as is the prime minister”, Dr McPherson said.
The Southland Times Sat March 6th
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Sh*t!
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2010/03/crony-dictator.html
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Nasty rumours.
http://www.starcanterbury.co.nz/local/news/shipley-touted-as-ecan-commissioner/3910802/
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I see an attempt to paint environmental issues as a problem caused by those on the “right” and in this case vested interests are getting on to Ecan to push their barrow. The same happens in the urban environment (where the majority of us live) but there the left is weak as they will not speak out against demand from mass migration and subsequent, selling off the Kiwi life style and (once affordable) property.
Somebody is drinking all that milk. Someone in the Green Party ought to find out who (and how much more they’ll be drinking).
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The head negotiator for the Central Pains resource consent drew on a couple of texts. One was:
Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action Ostrom, Elinor, Cambridge University Press, 1990
Ostrom showed that under certain conditions common pool resources can be successfully managed and…
“certain common property regimes are perfectly compatible with capitalism or, since they seem to shy away from such a term, with “markets.” Indeed, much of their discussion of particular “successful” commons center on these commodity-producing commons. From Maine lobster fisheries to Alpine pastures, commodities have been profitably produced over long periods of time through the self-regulating behavior of fishers and pastoralists operating in common property regimes (Acheson 2003) (Netting 1981).”
http://sustainabilityandthecommons.wordpress.com/2009/10/13/23/
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