The Times They Are a Changing: Environment Canterbury and Sustainable Fresh Water Management in New Zealand

Abstract

New Zealand’s Environment Minister, the Hon Nick Smith, recently compared the significance of water in New Zealand to that of oil in Saudi Arabia. This comparison, whatever its other failings, demonstrates a recognition on the part of the New Zealand government of the diminishing nature of fresh water in this country. It echoes a statement made in 2004 by one of Mr Smith’s predecessors, that “until recently we have taken our abundance of freshwater in New Zealand for granted.” Indeed, over the last ten or twenty years any lingering thoughts we may have had about water as an infinite resource have been progressively but irresistibly overcome. We now know that water is not only finite, but actually dwindling. Unfortunately, we also know that it is crucial to the existence of all the things in New Zealand that are worth having or doing. The Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA), which provides the structure and process by which water is managed in New Zealand, was enacted well before these developments about water came to our attention. One of the ways this is reflected is in the focus of the Act on the effects of individual resource consent applications. This makes it is very difficult for regional councils to manage cumulative adverse effects on the environment and water supply, as the legal focus is on individuals rather than the larger picture of what is best for the region. Such an issue would of course be less likely to arise if the resource in question were an abundant one, but regrettably this is no longer the case (if indeed it ever was). As competition for access to water rights increases, strategies have been developed both in the courts and within regional councils to manage the RMA processes fairly. Unfortunately, these have only served to further increase the emphasis on the short-sighted resource consent process, and obscure the more fundamental problem that the Act is based on an outdated world view.