Farmer fears cutting stock numbers only way to meet environmental standards

A Taranaki farmer fears he will have to cut stock numbers to meet increasingly onerous environmental standards.

The dairy farmer - who RNZ has agreed not to identify - was attending one of a series of Taranaki Regional Council drop-in events designed to get public feedback on targets for its new Taranaki Land and Freshwater Plan.

At the events people can get information on and offer opinions about E.coli levels in the region's rivers and streams, animal effluent systems, water allocation, sediment loads, stormwater and wastewater discharges and fish passages among other topics.

One of the more stark messages at the Inglewood event was that E. coli loads needed to reduce 50 percent on average to meet draft environmental outcomes for fresh water and in some cases by as much as 80 percent.

The farmer - who owns two dairy properties - said he was unsure what more people working in the sector could do.

"I haven't got an answer for that because we've been working at it for a long time with riparian and all that stuff, fencing waterways off. We've got dual consents [to discharge to land and water] and we're irrigating when we can.

"We've been trying for such a long time. We've been planting, everything is fenced, so I'm not sure where to head to from here. Maybe less cows on the land, that's probably the next step."

He said most farmers were on board with making changes and didn't want to see a return to the practices of the past.

"I know when I was a young fella effluent was just hosed out and it went straight to the river and at milking times the rivers were green and that's gone. I'm going back ... we're talking 45 years ago."

Egmont Village dairy farmer Mark Duynhoven thought farming practices were more environmentally sound than ever.

"I think it's improving, there's more people transitioning from discharging to water to discharging to land, there's more riparian plants going in the ground.

"If I take our situation we've planted probably 5000 riparian plants, we are using slow-release phosphate fertiliser, our nitrogen fertiliser is probably down by two thirds and our stocking rate is probably less than it was five years ago."

Duynhoven was concerned about a proposal for outside experts to evaluate effluent systems.

"I'm mostly worried about being forced to use consultants. When there's a requirement to use consultants they will generally charge a lot and it's just adding cost to our business for no real gain.

"We get a yearly inspection from the Taranaki Regional Council inspector and it's pretty obvious if your effluent pond is leaking or not."

Photographer Tony Green did a lot of work for environmental groups and thought problems with water quality were not exclusive to farmers.

"The Waiwhakaiho River, there are whio on that river. Those whio have been seen down as far as the intake to Lake Mangamahoe, but nothing below Lake Mangamahoe.

"How many farms are below Lake Mangamahoe in terms of access to the water? Not many. There's a lot of places where dogs are free to roam, free to get in the water, free to crap everywhere and people, people get in there."

Green said bird life along riparian strips heading up to the national park boundary was becoming more abundant due to the work farmers had done.

Janice and Rex Carroll farm 400 cows on the upper Taranaki ring plain.

Janice Carroll thought the drop-in event was a good idea.

"It is increasingly concerning how much we have to be aware of, but then I think the rest of the country has become more aware as well, so I don't think it is such a bad thing to try and be a good custodian of your bit of land."

Rex Carroll said farming practices had improved.

"I used to milk a larger herd to my neighbour. He'd finish milking before me and wash down the yard directly into the river and when I used to fill the hot water heater it was green every night because it was just a timing thing, so things have changed dramatically and all for the better."

He had put in a water treatment unit about 25 years ago.

"We tested our water for E. coli and it was just off the map, so we treat the water and I wonder how the neighbours get on because we used to get staph in the herd all the time."

Taranaki Regional Council director of operations Daniel Harrison said it wanted to understand what the public wanted for the province from an environmental perspective.

"What they want from our rivers in terms of biodiversity, water quality and habitat."

Harrison said E. coli was an indicator pathogen for other bugs in water that could have an impact on human health and the health of waterways and what lived in them as well as animals such as cows, dogs or birds.

"So, the science is telling us some of those levels are not where we want them to be to ensure the health of our community and particularly of people. It's about looking at what are the causes of the pollution of the E. coli coming into waterways and what we can do about it, so that might be around putting effluent onto land rather than directly into waterways that will have a filtering effect."

Harrison said generally most people were supportive of making improvements to the environment and consumers all around the world were now demanding a higher level of environmental guardianship.

"If we want to continue to sell our produce to the rest of the world then we need to meet those standards."

He said the council had been working with landowners for more than 30 years and had achieved a lot.

"We've got a world-class riparian programme, we have world-class hill country programmes and our pest control programmes are also world class.

"And the majority of the cost has been borne by landowners by farmers. They've been doing this work themselves and they've been paying for it themselves. We want to continue that relationship and we want to continue to work with landowners to take it to the next level."

Harrison said feedback from farmers had been largely positive.

"They can sometimes see these things as another thing to do or another cost, but as long as we manage that in a way that is appropriate, affordable, realistic and practicable - which is the way we want to work - then it shouldn't be too much of a problem and most people are getting that."