Federated Farmers says pressing pause on the rollout of freshwater farm plans until improvements can be made is a practical and pragmatic step from the Government.

"Farmers across the country will be breathing a sigh of relief that common sense has finally prevailed with farm plans," says Federated Farmers freshwater spokesperson Colin Hurst.

"There’s been a huge amount of uncertainty hanging over farmers heads for the last year, with many wondering what’s happening."

Federated Farmers support the use of farm plans as an affordable and flexible alternative to onerous national rules or expensive resource consents.

Hurst says farmers also support the use of farm plans as a tool to help improve environmental outcomes, but they need to be practical, cost-effective, and easy to use.

"Unfortunately, the system put in place by the previous Government was nothing short of a bureaucratic birds' nest for farmers that failed on all three counts," Hurst says.

"They took a really good concept that had widespread buy-in from farmers and the wider primary sector and made it completely unworkable and unaffordable.

"Needlessly complex rules and duplication of effort added nothing but cost and frustration for farmers, who just want to do the right thing."

Hurst says the prospect of a five-figure bill for a new farm plan eroded a lot of goodwill from farmers, particularly those who already had a perfectly good plan in place.

More than 10,000 farmers already have some form of farm plan through their milk processor, meat processor or regional council requirements.

None of those existing plans would have been recognised under the current regulations.

"The whole process has felt incredibly messy for farmers, with many facing a legal requirement to get a new plan before proper systems and processes were even in place," Hurst says.

"Thousands of farmers in Southland and Waikato were expected to have a certified fam plan by February 2025, but until very recently there weren’t even certifiers in place to do the work."

Federated Farmers understands that after 12 months of the rules being active, only a single farmers in the entire country has actually got a certified freshwater farm plan approved.

"Those completely unrealistic timeframes and requirements meant these regulations were set to fail from the get-go," Hurst says.

"The Government has made the right decision pausing the rollout of freshwater farm plans while the rules are being reviewed.

"There's no point continuing to waste millions of dollars of farmers' money trying to force a square peg into a round hole."

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