Rural water users keen to co-operate

Federated Farmers Hawke's Bay branch president Will Foley says farmers and urban communities need to overcome their divisions to make progress with water issues. PHOTO/PAUL TAYLOR

Overcoming divisions is the central challenge for effective freshwater management in New Zealand, but Hawke's Bay is making positive steps to achieving this, said environmental policy specialist Guy Salmon.

Mr Salmon is executive director of Ecologic - an independent think tank focused on finding solutions that integrate environment, economy and society.

He was a guest speaker at the water symposium and said the divisions included those between environmentalists and farmers, as well as between iwi and the rest of New Zealand.

"In both cases we are in a transition phase. Regional councils used to be mainly farmer oriented organisations and iwi could not get themselves elected to them, and they have been alienated from the process of finding solutions.

"Fish and Game started talking about dirty dairying in 2002 and although it was legitimate, now it is on the agenda we need to start looking at solutions."

Collaboration was key, and he said the TANK process under way in Hawke's Bay was a step in the right direction.

Jerf van Beek is chairman of the Twyford Irrigation Group, which manages a co-operative, members of which last year signed over their individual water rights to become part of a global consent, where participants work together to manage the allocation.

Mr van Beek was also involved in TANK and said horticulture was well represented in these discussions and leading from the front in ensuring all stakeholders were part of the conversation.

He said horticulturists already had the GAP system that ensured growers were following procedures to look after the water resource, but also that water was a community responsibility.

"It's not a regulator space, it's an 'us' space.

"Rather than going on as normal within regulations, the aim would be that the science and commitment was there to do better than what the regulator wants."

An example of this was in the Twyford catchment early this year during the drought, when members of the irrigator co-operative made contingencies to augment the water in the Raupare Stream to avoid an irrigation ban.

"This catchment has not had a proud history, but people in the area are working on it and it's slowly improving."

Federated Farmers Hawke's Bay branch president Will Foley said changing behaviours to protect water sources was also important in the agriculture sector, but this needed to be coupled with more positive urban/rural relationships.

"So far what we have been doing has not been working - the negative stories that are highlighted about farming practices are not encouraging farmers to look at other solutions, if anything it's turning them away more."

A sheep and beef farmer himself, with three properties across Central Hawke's Bay, he said farmers did need to do things differently, and needed to be sitting around the table with other stakeholders when discussing such issues.

"Rather than focusing on the numbers and nutrient limits, we want to see farmers focusing on the values they want to achieve regards water, and also celebrate the successes - make sure the community knows the good work that's going on."

He acknowledged that despite the best intentions, there was always going to be "ratbag" farmers who baulked against change.

"Not all farmers are going to be perfect and those are the ones that need to have the pressure kept on them."

Mr Salmon said during the hui he was impressed with the positive approach being taken by the different parties.

"I thought there was quite a lot of mutual respect in Hawke's Bay - people are no longer sniping with each other.

"I was also heartened to see the amount of work going on in the region around the aquifers."