Existing Mechanisms Inadequate For Water Management
March 11th, 2009
Regional plans and resource consents emerge as inadequate to the task of ensuring good governance of water resources. This is the major finding of a FRST-funded project looking into water management issues in Canterbury, commissioned by the CRI, Landcare Research Ltd. The report’s author, Professor Neil Gunningham from the Australian National University, concludes “neither of the principal options through which water can be allocated under the RMA – regional plans and consents – are capable of effectively constraining water takes or or ensuring allocation to its highest-value use.” Instead, he proposes serious consideration of a “collaborative environmental governance” approach which would require the interaction of competing public, private and non-government interests around common goals.
“Smart regulation” which would encourage the involvement of diverse stakeholders as “surrogate regulators” would also become important. Landcare Research’s principal scientist, Bob Frame, welcomed the report, but stresses solutions will vary greatly from case to case, and rely very largely on goodwill among the parties. He says “what we’re seeing in Canterbury today is the intense complexity of these water allocation issues and the involvement of a large number of interested parties. Sadly, we’re at a point where simple trade-off between different options is unrealistic and there may be no ideal solution. We have to look for hybrid ways. It will involve people with widely differing views sitting down together and starting to out what compromises are acceptable. The issues are so complex there aren’t always win-wins.” See the report at www.landcareresearch.co.nz/research
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