Hurunui mix might be just right
Released 06 Aug 2010
Dr Lionel Hume, Federated Farmers policy advisor
Development of the Canterbury Water Management Strategy (CWMS) and replacement of elected regional councillors by Government-appointed commissioners were critical turning points for the management of water in Canterbury. The CWMS was developed on the basis of wide-ranging technical study and extensive community and stakeholder consultation. It must now be implemented so that water infrastructure development can occur alongside environmental protection and restoration, in a way that largely avoids adversarial, costly and time-consuming legal processes.
The Environment Canterbury (ECan) commissioners have imposed a moratorium on consent applications to take or use water from the Hurunui River in North Canterbury.
This action was taken because of competing demands for water and because of the jumble of planning processes currently underway. These processes include Canterbury's Proposed Natural Resources Regional Plan (NRRP); Variation 8 to that plan (which sets a flow and allocation regime); an application for a Water Conservation Order and consent applications by Hurunui Water Project for a water storage and irrigation scheme.
The intention is that the moratorium will allow time for the CWMS to become established; for the regional and zone committees (being set up to govern and implement the CWMS) to become engaged with water management issues in the Hurunui catchment and to collaboratively decide how the CWMS will be implemented.
The ECan commissioners have stated their intention to use a collaborative approach, consistent with the CWMS, to deal with the Water Conservation Order application. This is great news. The applicants and submitters will be invited to resolve issues relating to the application using Environment Court mediation, instead of the alternative more adversarial and time-consuming processes.
Collaborative processes are also envisaged for amending the NRRP after it becomes operative, developing comprehensive catchment-based plans and for dealing with Hurunui Water Project's consent applications.
Wise management of water is vital for Canterbury's (and New Zealand's) future, we all agree on that. Moratoria are not the key to wise water management, or to implementation of the CWMS, but in the case of the Hurunui, the ECan commissioners have probably got the right mix.
