Essential Freshwater Package

In August 2020, the Government announced changes to the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management (NPS-FM), the National Environmental Standard for Freshwater (NES-FW) and changes to the Resource Management Act.

There are a number of areas within the NES-FW that came into force on 3 September 2020. Here we provide more comprehensive guidance on the regulations relating to changes to wetlands and rivers, intensive winter grazing, intensification, stockholding areas and stock exclusion. Please call our consents team for specific advice on your activities.

We continue to coordinate with industry groups, business, consultants and others to discuss the requirements and get their input into solutions that could work for Southland.

We know there’s a lot of confusion and anxiety about these changes and what they mean, so we’re going to share as much information as we can, as often as we can, in clear and meaningful ways.

Find answers to your questions about the Essential Freshwater package here.

Advice - Intensive winter grazing

Our website now features a cultivation and intensive winter grazing mapping tool; a checklist to see whether resource consent is required; and an online resource consent application process. Check them out here.

If you carried out winter grazing in 2021 and you're not planning on making any changes to the scale, scope or intensity of your wintering, then you may have what's called 'Existing use rights'.

If this applies to your situation, this means that there is a 6-month period from the point when the wintering regulations come into force - 1 November 2022 - to apply for consent. You may be able to carry out your winter grazing next year, but you may need to apply for a consent under the new rules by 31 April 2023.

Changes to wintering rules

The Government made amendments to the intensive winter grazing rules within the National Environmental Standards for Freshwater in April 2022.

Environment Southland welcomes the Government’s proposed changes as they look to make the intensive winter grazing rules more practical for councils and farmers to apply and comply with.

In summary the amendments to the permitted activity conditions include:

To remove the date for resowing, change to as soon as practical
To remove the specifics on pugging, change to take reasonable practical steps to avoid
Change measurement of slope to maximum allowable slope rather than mean slope (retain 10-degree threshold)
A new condition to protect critical source areas. These must be left ungrazed, have vegetation as ground cover, and they must not be cultivated in annual forage crop

A further 6-month deferral to the commencement of the regulations has been put in place, now beginning on 1 November 2022.

Southland Intensive Winter Grazing Advisory Group

The Southland Intensive Winter Grazing Advisory Group was established following a meeting with the Ministers in September and asked to look at the implementation of the intensive winter grazing rules within the new National Environmental Standards for Freshwater.

The group included several farmers, and staff from Beef + Lamb NZ, DairyNZ, Federated Farmers, Fish and Game and Environment Southland, who have worked together on finding practical solutions to some of the issues raised with implementing the regulations across the country.

The groups' recommendations were presented to Ministers in December 2020. Read more in the media release here.

Download the Southland Intensive Winter Grazing Advisory Group report.

Advice - Stock exclusion

Stock exclusion from waterways is required under both the proposed Southland Water and Land Plan and the regulations that form part of the Essential Freshwater package.

The rules in Southland’s proposed plan and the national regulations do not fit well together, so if you’d like to chat through your specific situation, please give our consents team a call on 0800 76 88 45.

Check out this factsheet for more information on our rules and those in the national legislation > Download the stock exclusion factsheet.

Advice - Nitrogen cap

The National Environmental Standards for Freshwater has introduced a limit to the amount of nitrogen that can be applied to land.

From July 2021 if the use of nitrogen fertiliser on pastoral land exceeds 190 kg/ha/year then a consent will be required. This cap does not apply to arable or horticultural land use.

New reporting requirements

The National Environmental Standards require any person operating a dairy farm to report to Council each year on their nitrogen fertiliser use. This reporting includes information on the types of fertiliser used, the rate of application and the location and date of application. This reporting requirement starts on 30 June 2021 with the first reports due in by 31 July 2022. While we are developing an online form for farmers to report this information to Council, we recommend you keep a note each month of your fertiliser application.

If you need a consent, give us a call to chat through the process. As part of the application, you will need to show that:

through a synthetic nitrogen reduction plan you will reduce your fertiliser use each year so by July 2023 it is no longer exceeding the cap; or
by ensuring the rate at which nitrogen may enter water does not exceed the baseline rate (the rate of nitrogen entering water if the nitrogen cap is met).

The standards in the National Environmental Standards are in addition to the permitted activity criteria in the proposed Southland Water and Land Plan and any discharge of fertiliser still needs to meet the conditions in Rule 14.

Advice - Fish Passage

New Zealand has more than 50 species of native freshwater and sports fish. It’s important that instream structures are designed to allow for fish passage, so that fish can move upstream and downstream between different river and stream habitats and complete their lifecycle.

Culverts, weirs, flap gates, fords and dams installed after 3 September 2020 must meet minimum reporting requirements such as height, width and location under the Essential Freshwater regulations. Culverts, weirs and flap gates must meet minimum environmental conditions for fish passage and may need a resource consent.

While the new regulations do not apply to instream structures installed before 3 September 2020, it is still important to ensure those structures provide for fish passage. There are options for remediating or retrofitting structures to help fish passage.

For further advice on fish passage requirements, or if you have any questions, you can contact our biodiversity team on 0800 76 88 45.

Other useful information

Government policy documents

Click here to view the range of factsheets from the Ministry for the Environment.

Other information from the Ministry for the Environment includes:

People, Water and Land programme

Find out about the People, Water and Land programme - Te Mana of te Tangata, te Wai, te Whenua and the work being done. This programme has been designed to ensure we can meet the community expectations for our waterways, and those of the Government. You can read more about the things that Southlanders told us were important to them about our waterways (the values) and learn more about the goals (outcomes) we're aiming to achieve by improving, protecting and restoring our waterways. https://waterandland.es.govt.nz/