These are significant proposed changes for our sector and will have profound impacts on the way many of us farm.
The goals and intentions of the proposals are good. We all want waterways that are in good shape.
The previous government’s goal of making them wadeable was silly and didn’t help its electoral chances but these ones set the bar too high so we need to find some middle ground where the waterways do improve but we are pragmatic about this.
We need to make the powers that be understand that any human activity will have an impact on the environment. The trick is to find a compromise.
That compromise is where we can continue to have a decent standard of living with tax paid so the services for citizens we have now continue and the waterways are improved but they aren’t going to be like they were before humans arrived.
As farmers we do have a long history of an ethos of leaving the land better than we found it.
We have shown over the last 40 years an ability to change and adapt, often quite radically.
This is yet another challenge that is coming at us ready or not and we are just going to have to deal with it the best we can.
Those of us in the Tuki Tuki catchment in Hawke’s Bay have already been getting our heads around these matters with the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council’s Plan Change 6.
Those who farm around Lake Taupo, folk dealing with Horizons’ One Plan and farmers in other regions whose regional councils have already set off on this path have already got a feel for some of the challenges ahead.
Many are already heavily engaged in practices to reduce nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment from our farms.
Although some in the rural sector say they would prefer that these changes are voluntary rather than mandated, we all know there will always be a proportion of folk who just won’t change the way they do things unless forced to. These laggards will be the ones the mainstream media will focus on and bring the whole sector into disrepute.
I am worried about the proposed regulations on changing stock policies where those of us with already low emissions are trapped in existing systems. Effectively, they are giving up the right to improve their income and equity to subsidise operations who are not as environmentally friendly.
And regulations on winter feed cropping are going to be very problematic. We know winter feed crops are a way of getting animals through the winter to harvest the bounty of spring but the public and regulators see only those bloody photos of dairy cows’ knee deep in mud.
The consultation period is obviously inadequate. Six weeks is the standard timeframe governments use for these matters but given the economic and social impacts these proposals have on our sector and because it’s our busiest time of the year, it’s simply not long enough.
I know those who lobby on our behalf will do their best with this timeframe but consultation is also about people feeling they have been listened to and their opinions and views weighed up before important decisions are made – decisions that will affect their profitability, their equity, their lifestyle and the communities they live in.
These regulations are coming at us whether we like it or not.
We must push for pragmatism and compromise before they are set in stone but without sounding like naysayers and anti the environment.
A tricky ask but not impossible.
