The co-ordinator of a rally in Whangarei calling for better protection of fresh water resources said many issues about water allocation and use need to be addressed in Northland.
Te Tui Shortland, who put up her hand when the NZ Water Forum called for someone to muster a rally in every region or centre, said she hoped many Northlanders would attend the rally in response to those issues.
The Northland Save Our Water Rally on Tuesday is one of several similar nationwide events staged to coincide with the presentation of the New Zealand Water Forum petition at Parliament.
The petition calls for a moratorium on all water-bottling consents, and has its source in the Bung the Bore movement that stopped a water-bottling plant in Ashburton.
Ms Shortland said that in Northland the most contentious and largest scale commercial water bottling-scheme was at Poroti Springs - and reflected how the decision makers disregarded the legally designated cultural relationships and values.
Consents that would have allowed the scheme to go ahead have now lapsed but ownership of the springs' water has been the subject of a Waitangi Tribunal hearing, the report due to be released in May.
"Water was never considered as a commodity. It was considered as its own living being with which we held a spiritual and genealogical relationship," Ms Shortland said.
"Councils currently act as if they own it by allocating it to bottling companies and others who sell it as a commodity. That is one of the kaupapa that communities are raising alongside the water quality issues."
Similarly to the Bay of Plenty and other regions, Northland relies heavily on clean water for growing eco-tourism industry and organic food production as well as traditional horticulture and farming, Ms Shortland said.
Issues facing the region include takes from rivers for town supply during droughts, the need for the public to better conserve water, the need to convert from intensive farming, councils using rivers and wetlands for sewers and continued economic development drives which place further pressure on water, including swamp drainage, she said.
One of the messages Ms Shortland hoped Tuesday's rally highlighted was that the council needed to be more proactive in protecting fresh water quality, and should give more support to empower communities to take care of water.
The rally was originally planned for outside Northland Regional Council in Water St but the venue has been changed to under the canopy in the Cameron St Mall, from noon until 1pm.