Kate Acland: Beef + Lamb NZ Chair on the proposed changes to the Resource Management Act

Farmers are welcoming a proposal to remove difficult rules from the Resource Management Act. 

The Government's released three discussion documents proposing amending 12 current national directions and four new ones. 

They include changes to freshwater management and regulation of farming practices. 

Beef + Lamb New Zealand Chair Kate Acland told Ryan Bridge the Government's addressing issues they've been highlighting for a long time. 

She says the rules are complex, impractical, and in some cases, impossible to meet. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Beef and Lamb New Zealand are happy this morning after
yesterday's RMA reform announcement. We've got changes to freshwater management,
we've got the removal of land use capability. Kate Ackland,
chair of Beef and Lamb New Zealand, with me this morning.
Hi Kate, good morning, Good to have you on the show.
Can you give us just a rundown in simple terms

(00:20):
what this will mean for your average farm.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
So what we're saying is they're addressing some of the
issues that we've been calling for change on for a
long time, particularly in the freshwater space, because the rules
that were in place were complex, they weren't practical, and
actually in some cases they were impossible to meet. So
there would have been some really big implications, I think,
particularly for our hell country farmers and our more extensive

(00:46):
farmers that we're facing some really costly sensing and stock
exclusions particularly.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
And so this means it's less about this number, that number,
that metric and more about the overall health of their
waterways of the environment. Is that a good summary?

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Yeah, absolutely, And just removing some of those very sort
of specific rules that, as I said, were impossible to meet,
you know, There's one example that they had a number
around suspended fine sentiments that independent research showed that even
if you stopped agriculture and the catchments were returned to
their natural state so to bush effectively, and thirty eight

(01:29):
percent of the rivers still wouldn't meet those natural bottom
line numbers that they put in place, So, you know,
just really impractical.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
So the bar was too high, way too high.

Speaker 2 (01:39):
Well, absolutely way too high. And you know, some modeling
suggested that you'd need to shut down forty four percent
of all she can be farmland and repire it and
you still wouldn't meet some of these numbers. So really
pleasing to see that sort of consultation on a change
in direction.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
K do we have to be worried about her intet
national reputation? We don't want to look like some sort
of backwater that's with dirty river water running through our
country towns now.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
I look absolutely that front of mind, and we can
have both. I mean, I think what it's about is
finding the balance between world class healthy waterways, which we
do have, by the way, and also of ourlan for
a really productive and profitable rural sector. You know, you've
got to acknowledge that farming can have an impact on

(02:29):
freshwater qualities like everything else that we do around our waterways,
but we've got to manage it right and what we
desperately need. Our rural communities need to thrive, They need
to be productive, but they need rules that are uncomplicated
and expensive and actually deliver the right outcomes, which has

(02:49):
been a whole of ecosystem health.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
Okay, appreciate your time this morning. Thanks for coming on
the show. Kate Ackland, Chaps and at Beef and Lamb
New Zealand.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
For more from early edition with Ryan's Bread.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
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