The Government plans to give water storage and irrigation
projects a shot in the arm, and later this year will reduce
regulatory "roadblocks" constraining the sector in
Canterbury.
"The Government is committed to ensuring that water storage
and irrigation projects which meet environmental standards,
and which are good economic propositions, can happen in a
decent time frame," Prime Minister John Key said in an
outline of his policy agenda to the first sitting of
Parliament for 2010.
"This will include removing regulatory roadblocks to water
storage in Canterbury," he said.
The area of land being irrigated in New Zealand has doubled
every decade since the 1960s and irrigation takes up 77
percent of all allocated water. Canterbury has nearly 70
percent of the irrigated land and about 86 percent of water
used in Canterbury is used for irrigation.
Water is currently allocated to farmers under the Resource
Management Act, with most paying only for the consent process
and monitoring, but the Parliamentary Commissioner for the
Environment, Jan Wright, has warned dairy farmers are not
paying enough for the pollution they cause and a price needs
to be put on water.
The Canterbury regional council, Environment Canterbury, last
year announced an ambitious water strategy it said would
restore waterways affected by intensive land use, including
farming, and would feature fences and planting stretching
hundreds of kilometres to protect streams and wetlands.
But the council also said special legislation would be
required to provide a legal framework for the 10 committees
that the strategy suggested oversee water zones in
Canterbury.
Changes to the Resource Management Act and the Local
Government Act might be necessary to allow the new structure
to operate.
The Government has created a land-and-water forum to look at
water allocation and report to the Government in July this
year.
Nationally, a farmgate value of around $800 million has been
estimated for the 1100 million cubic metres of water used
each year for irrigation, from a total consumption of 1920
million cubic metres. Another 350 million cubic metres is
used for livestock.
Agricultural officials have estimated that the country could
sustain another 200,000 hectares of land being irrigated --
adding $330 million earnings annually at the farmgate.
According to the Business Council for Sustainable Development
the existing system of water allocation will result in water
in all major catchments being fully allocated by 2012.
Options which have been previously canvassed include making
it easier for farmers and other users to transfer water
consents -- also likely to lead to a commercial trade in
water rights -- and axing the present first-in, first-served
allocation system for water.
Between 20 percent and 80 percent of water allocated for
commercial use -- including municipal water supplies -- is
not being used at any one point in time, and the Business
Council has said government intervention to ease the transfer
of water from one commercial user to another could boost the
economy by between $180 million and $300 million annually.
