Hawke’s Bay Regional Council today unaminously agreed to take action to manage the impacts of land use practices in the Taharua Catchment.
The Council recognises the outstanding values of the Mohaka River and its tributaries, and aims to improve the quality of water flowing downstream into the Mohaka River.
Through the establishment of a Taharua Catchment Stakeholder group, Council will work closely with the land owners and key stakeholders in the area.
The focus will be on land management initiatives that can be implemented relatively quickly as well as long term changes to the farming systems. The stakeholder group will also be involved in the process of developing the regulatory framework to be included in the Council’s Regional Resource Management Plan.
‘If we can work alongside this group and gain a common understanding of the issues and management options, the formal part of the planning process may go a lot more smoothly and quickly,” says Chairman Alan Dick.
“There is a need to regulate to back up the education but that regulation should focus on effects of land use practices. This is a significant decision for the Council and it should not be underrated.”
There had been some concern about the Council’s adoption of a ‘zero tolerance’ approach to non-compliance and what that might mean for landowners, particularly the dairy farmers in the Taharua catchment.
Council has always used a range of tools to encourage compliance from communication and education through to formal enforcement action as they have taken various factors into consideration.
The ‘zero tolerance’ approach means the Council will take a much firmer line on breaches of resource consent conditions in this catchment, particularly if there have been earlier problems. The ‘zero tolerance’ approach does not mean “one strike and you are out” with prosecution a certainty. Various factors still have to be taken into consideration for any incident - such as the size of the problem, its effects and the actions taken by the landowner.
“Hawke’s Bay Regional Council has confirmed that it is necessary to use regulation to limit the effects of land use, because of virtually conclusive evidence that intensive dairying is causing severe pollution of the Taharua and Mohaka,” said Chairman Alan Dick.
“Council rejected the notion of regulating land use, ie to ban dairying, as other forms of intensive farming or agriculture can be just as or even more problematic than dairying. But there has to be some responsibility taken by landowners for generating negative effects on valued waterways.” |