One Plan 101 for visiting MP’s
Released 30 Jul 2010
Dr Tessa Mills, Federated Farmers regional policy advisor
Five Members of Parliament visited a dairy farm last week to find out first hand how Horizons Regional Council's One Plan in its current form could seriously impact economic growth in the region.
The visit by MP's, representing National, Labour and Act, was a Federated Farmers initiative to give them a better understanding of the issues facing our region's farmers.
The One Plan, made up of the regional policy statement and all the regional plans is, in general, tougher than the preceding plans, with regulation playing a bigger role than ever before.
Federated Farmers has been involved in the One Plan process from the start, submitting to the whole Plan and making oral submissions on each of the chapters.
Regulation around Nitrogen (N) leaching is a key feature of the One Plan and is an attempt to address water degradation in our rivers and streams. However, the onerous regulatory approach puts many of our regions farmers is a difficult economic position.
On the visited farm, the owners have spent a large amount of money putting in systems to mitigate environmental impacts. Their business ticks all the boxes for mitigation under the One Plan proposal and may still be unable to gain consent to operate under the regulations as proposed.
The Lake Taupo catchment, under Environment Waikato, has just opened its nitrogen trading board where farmers buy and sell Nitrogen Discharge Allowance (NDA) units.
Farms in the catchment are assigned an NDA level each year as a cap, based on kilograms of N per hectare. Farmers not utilising their NDA capacity can sell to other farmers requiring a higher N allowance. Funds stay within the farming sector and the outcome sought are still achieved.
This catchment-based approach has some merit, primarily that it does not penalise existing enterprises the way the One Plan may. A regional economy that is so reliant on a viable productive sector, can poorly afford policy that does not address all facets of sustainable production namely environment, economy, cultural and social.
To discuss this or any other issues, please call 0800 FARMING (327 646)
