Significant fines handed out today to a Crafar farming company and members of the Crafar family are a clear sign of the intolerance the courts and the wider community have for environmental offending that further degrades water quality, says Environment Waikato. (Read on …)
New Zealand is promoted overseas as 100% Pure – a clean, green, environmentally conscious kind of place.
But with 90 percent of our lowland rivers said to be too polluted to swim in, is our image based on a lie? (Read on …)
Otago Regional Council’s Dairy Focus Farm programme has been completed after six years of providing guidance to and sharing knowledge with dairy farmers on caring for the environment on their properties. (Read on …)
Environment Canterbury councillors have endorsed setting up a working group to oversee public consultation on the State of Environment Monitoring Charges for water management. The decision was taken at their meeting on Thursday, July 30.
Environment Canterbury chair Sir Kerry Burke said that the implementation of the proposed cost recovery for water management charging had been deferred for twelve months. This will allow for greater community input and more time for consultation with key stakeholders and consent holders.
“Over half of the submissions made on Environment Canterbury’s draft long term plan related to water management cost recovery. Councillors have not dropped the charging proposal. Rather, it has been deferred for a year. It is important that this message is conveyed to our regional communities,” said Sir Kerry.
The working group will consist of three councillors, Eugenie Sage, Jo Kane and Angus McKay, and eight representatives from consent holders, local authorities, Ngai Tahu and environmental interests.
“Some councillors were concerned that the management zone governance arrangements needed further consultation, hence the need to revisit the proposal.”
“Council has granted the working group broad terms of reference. This involves the group developing and overseeing the consultation process and reporting on the outcomes and recommendations to the Council by the end of January 2010.”
“There will be an independent technical assessment of costing and how that breaks down between cost recovery charges and the general rate, the basis on which consent holders will be charged and what options there are for addressing unusual or rare consents for example, water takes for hydro electricity projects.”
“This will bring more clarity to the work that has already been done and will better inform councillors when we make our Annual Plan decisions in 2010”, said Sir Kerry.
A Matamata dairy farmer and an earthworks contractor have collectively been fined nearly $59,000 in total for illegal, large-scale earthworks which led to tonnes of extra sediment getting into the Waihou River in 2007. (Read on …)
Waharoa dairy factory operator Open Country Cheese has been fined more than $11,000 over the illegal dumping of up to 20,000 litres of sludge which contaminated local waterways. (Read on …)
A $50 million Waitangi Tribunal compensation claim for damage to the Tarawera River is being planned by Eastern Bay of Plenty iwi Ngati Rangitihi. (Read on …)
Poor relations between dairy farm owners and sharemilkers cannot be any sort of excuse for breaking effluent management rules, says an Environment judge.
The comment came this week in a Tokoroa District Court ruling from Judge Melanie Harland concerning a Putaruru dairy farm owned by The Crossing Ltd at the time of the offending. Its sharemilker was We 8 Yoko Ltd.
Both defendants pleaded guilty to a charge of unlawfully discharging untreated dairy shed effluent on to land last year in circumstances where it may enter groundwater. The Crossing Ltd was fined $13,000, while We 8 Yoko Ltd was fined $9,750. (Read on …)