Urgency and commitment is needed by dairy farmers to sort out their environmental compliance issues. Todays results show progress has been made in some areas, but in others, such as effluent disposal, non compliance rates rose.
With this years projected payout predicted to be high, lack of money to fix these problems can not be used as an excuse any longer.
Fonterra's "Every farm every year" campaign to address non compliance will work for the majority, but for the few that refuse to invest and sort these problems, Fonterra should use the big stick of not accepting non compliant farmers milk, to show they are serious in sorting these issues.
If this hard nosed economic stick was used on a few, changes would happen fast and the stigma of "dirty dairying" would fade for the industry. Get tough Fonterra.
Fonterra said today the slight increase in significant non-compliance with regional council dairy effluent rules was unacceptable, but believed its Every Farm Every Year inspections regime was a concerted effort to turn this result around. Today’s Dairying and Clean Streams Accord snapshot for the 2009/10 season shows significant national non-compliance rose by 1% to 16%, despite considerable improvements in Northland, Auckland, Hawkes Bay, Wellington, Canterbury and Otago.
Fonterra Group Director Supplier and External Relations, Kelvin Wickham said Every Farm Every Year was a concerted effort to address non-compliance by identifying farms at risk and ensuring remedial plans were put in place. “The programme got underway nationally in August so it was never going to change last season’s results. But what is encouraging is that the compliance message is getting through and farmers are taking it seriously. That’s also evident in the snapshot results for full compliance which rose 5% to 65% last season.”
He said Fonterra’s Sustainable Dairying Advisors have completed 1188 consultations with farmers keen to ensure their on-farm effluent infrastructure is able to cope with the year-round demands put on it. By the end of this season we expect to have 1,000 remedial plans in place. Since August, 252 farms have already completed their plans and a further 582 are underway. There are no quick fixes but farmers are working hard to get it right and in many cases a significant investment is needed to ensure systems are compliant 365 days a year.”
The snapshot showed 85% of farms nationally now have stock excluded from waterways and in Northland, Canterbury, Otago and Southland 90% have been excluded. Less than 2% of farms required bridges or culverts for waterways. Nutrient budgets had been adopted by 99% of farms but the challenge now was to work towards full management plans where nutrient inputs and outputs are measured and managed.
“Every Farm Every Year assesses whether an on-farm system is fit for purpose 365 days a year. This is about risk assessment and mitigation, not compliance monitoring. “We know effluent storage capacity, irrigation systems and feed pads or standoffs are all potential trouble spots. Without adequate storage farmers can’t defer irrigation in wet conditions and Every Farm Every Year helps them recognise that. They are also recognising the value of effluent as a source of nutrients and can see the money spent on upgrading systems has a relatively quick payback through better grass growth and productivity.”
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