Ian McLean Green candidate for Tauranga

We have more cows on our landscape than ever. The pursuit of white gold – milk – has resulted in a doubling of the national dairy herd during the last 30 years to almost six million cows.

That milk helps pay for our imported TVs, cars and fuel. But there are environmental costs. Along with the greenhouse gas, methane, those cows produce about 300 million litres of effluent that must be processed and disposed – every day.
Some effluent ends up in our streams, rivers and lakes – raising nutrient loads and reducing water quality.

A recent Tauranga City Council survey on streams and swimming waterholes has thrown the spotlight on local water quality. Some counts detected more than four times the level of E. coli considered safe for swimming.

The Ngamuwahine River Reserve in the lower Kaimais was 10 times over safe levels. Counts routinely go up after rainfall.

Dairy farmers are just as concerned about the water quality issue as the rest of us and take the management of dairy-shed effluent very seriously.

Despite their efforts, full compliance with resource consent requirements declined from 79 to 72 per cent in the last year. Serious non-compliance – resulting in direct flow of effluent into waterways – was 13 per cent. With dairy intensification, the twin requirements of vigilance by regulators and individual responsibility by farmers must both increase.

The elephant in the room is the urine that is dumped onto the landscape by grazing cows. While some of it is taken up by growing grass, some also escapes into groundwater or is carried away as runoff. Effective management of this diffuse pollutant includes containing the cows – for example in a herd home. But that approach has problems.

Strike 1: Grass-fed cows apparently make milk that tastes better.
Strike 2: Cows in a herd-home must be fed and a popular choice is imported palm kernel. Strike 3: Most palm kernel comes from land that was once a habitat for orangutans.

A National Policy Statement for freshwater management took effect on July 1, 2011. The NPS provides a framework for enforcing water quality standards through regional plans. Sadly, it already appears to have been an opportunity lost.

The NPS was slow in coming and was criticised by both Greens and Labour for being watered down – sorry.

The reality is – it does not provide as much clear direction on standards as is desirable in such a foundation document.

Want to know more? Visit www.mfe.govt.nz/rma/central/nps/freshwater-management.html