A freshwater scientist says a government decision on measuring water quality has more to do with protecting the dairy industry than good science.
Scientists argue the best measure is to look at the impact on species living in the water - known as the macro-invertibrate community index (MCI).
The Ministry for the Environment said too many different environmental factors affect whether animals can live in streams making it difficult for councils to improve a bad MCI score.
But a freshwater scientist from Massey University, Mike Joy, suspects the reason the Ministry for the Environment is not using MCI is because it would hurt the dairy industry.
“They have an agenda for intensification and doubling agriculture in the next 20 or 30 years and so the only way they could achieve that was by giving headroom for more pollution of the rivers.”
Today, The Wireless looks at environmental impacts, including water quality, overfishing and fracking.