Week 3: The debate...

The debate around dairy farming and its environmental impact has seemingly taken over my life.

This week, as I have continued to slog through my source information, the writing of my opinion piece has not gotten any easier.  I've read and read...and read some more, and yet the very act of getting words to paper (or word doc in this instance) has alluded me for quite some time. Thankfully, I got a mojo kick at the latter half of the week, maybe after reading my team's Skype chat in my absence, and I now have something that slightly resembles an opinion piece.  It's about time.

I located two relevant sources which examine different points of view around the topic of increased regulation in farming to reduce environmental impacts; one being a chapter written by Jacqueline S. Rowarth of  the Waikato University Management School, the other an update report on water quality in New Zealand produced by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Dr. Jan Wright.

Rowarth's piece comes from the book 'Ecosystem Services in New Zealand' edited by John Dymond (2014), a collection of chapters written by leading scientists and academics with the aim to develop understanding of New Zealand ecosystems and the way they function.   Her chapter titled 'Dairy Cows - Economic Production and Environmental Protection' takes the position that farmers are already doing 'remarkably well' in their efforts to improve the condition of our waterways, and that calls for them to 'pay the full costs of their impact' do not acknowledge this hard work.  She also claims that it is only a few, headlined cases of bad practice which are tarnishing the reputation of the whole industry itself.  Rowarth believes that the development of the Clean Streams Accord in 2003 has raised environmental awareness and compliance on farm, and seen more community initiatives evolve.  She calls for New Zealand to develop systems that increase the efficiency of production, while maintaining ecosystem services, closing by asking the question, how much are we prepared to pay for this?  Rowarth, an academic of the Management School at Waikato University, takes a business perspective when examining this issue, and appears to sympathise with the plight of the farmer in this instance.  She looks for ways for farmers to maintain/improve profitability- this being her main concern - while reducing environmental impacts appear to be a secondary focus.  

The conflict between further developing the industry alongside improving the state of our waterways is seen throughout discussion around this issue, highlighted by our own Government who aim to double our agricultural exports by 2025, whilst spending tax and rate payers' money to clean-up the 'dirty' waterways that result from the high-input farming model needed to achieve this target.

Conflicting attitudes around this were highlighted in Dr. Jan Wright's (2015) update report on 'Water quality in New Zealand: Land use and nutrient pollution'.  This update report summarises reactions to the original report published in 2013, which clearly showed the correlation between increased nitrogen in waterways and large-scale land conversion into dairy farming.  One of the most interesting aspects of this report were the conflicting views presented by different political parties - the Prime Minister painted a positive image where we can increase production while maintaining or improving water quality, while the Ministers for the Environment and Primary Industries jointly acknowledged the importance of the Government's freshwater reform programme and state that water quality will significantly improve within a generation.  The positive picture painted by the current government is not surprising considering they are critiquing their own work.

Opposing political leaders were less optimistic.  Moana Mackey, Labour Party environment spokesperson asserted her view, stating that the reform programme was nothing more than 'business as usual', which would lead to further degradation of our waterways, while the Greens called for tougher standards to make our rivers safe for swimming.  Interested parties such as Federated Farmers, Fonterra and Sir David Skegg, President of the Royal Society for New Zealand also weighed in.  Federated Farmers and Fonterra both recognised their role in making improvements but were critical of the original report, saying it portrayed a worse case scenario and didn't take into account existing mitigation on farms. Sir David Skegg was firm in his stance.  He expressed strong concerns that the current steps in place will not reverse the trend of environmental impacts anytime in the near future, a sentiment shared by Prof. David Hamilton, President of the NZ Freshwater Sciences Society.  Dr. Jan Wright has attempted to be objective, to allow for a broad overview of responses to the original report from a range of interested parties.  We must be considerate of the fact that responses have been selected and may not express the individual or groups views in their entirety.  

Now that that's done, I need to go and make some changes to my position paper!  This basically sums up the last week for me - write, read, re-write, repeat.

Rowarth, J. S. (2014). Dairy Cows - Economic Production and Environmental Protection. In J. Dymond (Ed.), Ecosystem Services in New Zealand' (pp. 85-93). Lincoln, New Zealand: Manaaki Whenua Press.

Wright, J. Dr. (2015). Water quality in New Zealand: Land use and nutrient pollution(Update report). Wellington, New Zealand: Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.