RDRR Opposes Lake Rotorua Nutrient Management

RDRR OPPOSES BOP REGIONAL COUNCIL’S PLAN FOR LAKE ROTORUA NUTRIENT MANAGEMENT

Press Release: Rotorua District Residents and Ratepayers, 27 April 2016

RDRR is opposed to the Proposed Plan Change 10 (Lake Rotorua Nutrient Management) to the Bay of Plenty Regional Water and Land Plan, on six grounds.

PC10 aims to convert about 40% of dairying and 30% of sheep and beef farming into forestry plantation farming. RDRR calls instead for a three-part strategy that aims at both remediation and capacity building. First, an independent science review is needed with terms of reference consulted with stakeholders, so that policy and practices can be both informed by best current science and by the TORs having high legitimacy. Second, a commissioned economic, social, cultural and environmental impact assessment is needed, including a Section 32 RMA assessment of impact on stakeholders, to deliver a comprehensive evaluation of policy options and consequences, as required in law. Third, the BOPRC needs to empower Stream and Land Care Management Groups (S&LCMGs) with science about ‘hot spots’, mitigation strategies, and expert advice, so that they can develop collective and sustainable management capacities.

PC10 will knowingly disrupt the agribusiness sector which currently provides about 9% of the district’s GDP, with a much higher % of its export earnings. RDRR seeks an alternative policy with a far less disruptive effect on the district agribusiness’ economy, especially employment. PC10 will require a switch from high nitrogen (N) discharges, high food production, and high outputs into low N, low earnings from silviculture and much lower employment opportunities (about 42 people are employed in the value chain around a 1000 ha dairy farm, about 28 from a 1000 ha beef and sheep farm, compared to about 14 from a pine plantation of the same size).

PC10 will significantly lower rural capital values, a proportionate drop in the rural rates take, and if BOP and Rotorua Councils’ expenditures remain constant, yet another rise in urban and business rates. The RDRR recommends an alternative policy be developed with a much more reasonable impact on Rotorua Districts’ ratepayers, residents and businesses. To clarify, the core component of rating is capital values. Capital values in the Rotorua District per hectare average about $35,000 for dairy farms, about $15-20,000 for sheep and beef farms, and about $3,500 for pine plantations. The loss of dairy capital values in the Rotorua District due to PC10 has been estimated at $162m. A commensurate rates revenue loss would have to be recovered from other sectors, most particularly residential and business sectors.

PC10 is based on an obsolete belief from the 1980s in the sole need to reduce N levels. The RDRR seeks an alternative policy that shifts the focus from N to potassium (P) levels and uses a more holistic model of sustaining and improving water quality outcomes. This model will need to be responsive to unique local, social, cultural, economic, scientific and environmental factors, and deliver outcomes on all of these dimensions. Professor David Hamilton from Waikato University has shown that controlling P levels is a more achievable approach to lowering the Tropic Level Index. Evolving science since 2004-2006 shows declining P levels and that the TLI has reached the target of 4.21 (due mainly to limited P through mitigations such as in alum dosing some streams, and changed water treatment and farming practices).

PC10 is also based on an obsolete target of removing 435 tonnes of N per annum. The RDRR endorses an alternative policy of customising N mitigation strategies stream by stream, rather than by whole catchment. It recommends the development of Stream and Land Care Management Groups (S&LCMGs) to combine the benefits of best available science, including expert advice on ‘hot spots’, local knowledge, and empowering stakeholders. The 435 tonne target was based on the best available science of the day. Since then it has been shown that N discharges are higher from properties, that much more than previously thought is extracted from flow paths, and that these extractions can be further enhanced by many mitigation methods customised stream by stream, including changed farming practices. S&LCMGs would switch the focus of action from compliance to remediation and capacity building.

PC10 was designed to enable the operation of the BOPRC’s Incentive and Gorse programmes. The RDRR recommends that both programmes be suspended immediately. The focus of both programmes should then be moved away from incentivising land use changes (from food production to log extraction), towards a focus on green technologies that will permanently change nutrient loadings on the lakes. The Incentives programme model has struggled to gain the confidence of farmers and has not signed any agreements. $350,000 has been spent on salaries and administrative costs. The programme is also plagued by the chair’s perceived pecuniary conflict of interest and by low public accessibility and accountability.

In sum, the RDRR suggests a fresh policy approach to build on the proposals advanced in the PC10.

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