Rurawhe Adrian; Tirikatene Rino; Parker DavidCHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Ā kāti rā tēnā rā tātou katoa. The committee is resumed. Members when we rose for the dinner break we were considering the question that the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the annual financial statements of the Government for the 2019/20 financial year be noted. RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): Thank you Mr Chair. During the previous examination with the Minister of Agriculture he traversed some questions around water quality and I'd just like to ask the Minister for the Environment if he could take us through what's happening and what are his thoughts in relation to water quality. Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Thank you Mr Tirikatene. During the year under review this was actually the biggest piece of work that the ministry had on. It was against the background of declining water quality particularly in our rivers. Sadly the latest data from the Land Air Water Aotearoa data series showed that twice as many rivers are degrading in New Zealand as are improving according to the macroinvertebrate index and this is a long-term trend that has coincided with increasingly intensive methods of agricultural production. Not all the problems are in rural areas and some of the most serious problems are in urban areas but the rate of change has been greatest in respect of rural areas. Ninety-nine percent of rivers by length are in those rural areas so we've got to address those issues. So during this period—in September last year—we landed quite a comprehensive package that had three objectives. The first was to halt the decline the second was to show material improvements within five years and then clean waterways up to a decent standard over a generation. There are a number of components to that package. We've promulgated an updated national policy statement (NPS) on freshwater management. That had a number of new attributes in it that weren't previously regulated and has standards to achieve over a generation through plans that are promulgated by regional councils that have to achieve those outcomes which are essentially based on aquatic health. The guiding principle that's being used here is te mana o te wai which puts at the primary centre of water regulation the health of the waterway as the first priority; second human needs—for example drinking water—and third economic uses of the water. In addition to the national policy statement on freshwater management we changed the way in which new freshwater management plans are made through amendments to the Resource Management Act. The Resource Management Act now enables freshwater commissioners to involve themselves in that process and we've appointed two with the leading one of those for the first period being Emeritus Professor Peter Skelton who's a former Environment Court judge. So they will be assisting regional councils to make the plan changes that are necessary to give effect to the new national policy statement on freshwater management. We've also required farms over a certain size to have a farm plan or an environmental component of a farm plan which enables a farm by farm assessment of what are the critical source areas for erosion for example. Why is that a problem? Well we know that in some areas like the Kaipara we've got recent mudbanks that are 2 metres deep. This is the largest harbour in New Zealand and it's where the majority of snapper on the West Coast of New Zealand spawn and yet we've got such high sediment loads coming into that estuary that we literally have mudbanks of recent origin that are 2 metres deep. We have contributed at central government level $100 million to a restoration package. That money is being matched by local government and farmers in order to bring forward improvements there. In addition to the national policy statement on freshwater management we've promulgated a national environment standard (NES). Unlike an NPS which requires plan changes to give effect to what's required an NES has immediate effect. That NES puts in place controls on increasing intensification of agriculture. For example a new conversion to a dairy farm will require a resource consent so that we can consider whether there is an extra nutrient load that the river can't sustain and how adverse effects are minimised. It also puts controls on the additional area that can be put into intensive winter grazing. I've talked of the sediment problems that we've had up north. Around the South Island we have got serious problems of degradation of estuaries. We've got midland rivers in Southland where 90 percent of the macroinvertebrates are now dead compared with 30 years ago which means there's not many fish. The main cause of those problems there is sediment. Those sediment problems are most concentrated at the bottom of rivers. Where we have estuaries we've got estuaries there that are just covered with recent mud that is smothering and killing the shellfish beds. We've got kelp beds out at sea off the coast of Otago and Southland that are not thriving. They are decreasing in mass and indeed they're not just not as thick but also their area has decreased probably by about 50 percent. So we've got many serious problems in our fresh water. This package is meant to overcome them.