It has changed the eligibility criteria for landowners to sign up to its Sustainable Land Use Initiative.
The council now has money for one-off jobs on farms that do not have a sustainable land use whole farm plan and there is more money for properties with existing plans and Whanganui Catchment Strategy plans.
Council natural resources and partnerships manager Jon Roygard said the new criteria mean landowners without a whole farm plan are eligible for support for erosion control on priority land.
They might have only a small area needing attention but the change provides access to funding.
The programme aims to deliver 90,000 hectares of new whole farm plans and 13,665 hectares of erosion control work over the next four years.
“SLUI builds farm resilience to storms and helps improve water quality by keeping sediment out of streams and rivers,” he said.
“The programme has been very successful over the 12 years it has been under way, establishing over 740 whole farm plans across an area of 552,000 hectares and completing 36,000 hectares of erosion control work.”
Roygard said the council has secured $6.4 million for the next four years from the Ministry for Primary Industries’ hill country erosion fund and is working to further increase the amount of work on the ground.
In the year to June 570 erosion control jobs were completed through SLUI and the council’s land programme, with landowners doing more than 3600 hectares of erosion control work, which included planting 2.3 million trees and establishing 156km of fencing, catchment operations committee chairman David Cotton said.
“Our funding can contribute towards these activities as well as sediment traps, reversion of land in pasture to native cover and retiring of existing bush remnants. SLUI is definitely a great mechanism to assist with works on-farm to help landowners move towards evolving regulation.”
Farmers are asked for a contribution to work done on their properties.
If it comes under the hill country erosion fund MPI and the council might cover up to 70% of the cost while funding of other work can be at ratios of 50:50 or 30:70.
Roygard said with changes to freshwater regulations proposed, now is a good time for farmers to act.
“While we don’t know where the legislation is going, this is a great opportunity to get ahead.”
