December 1, 2015 2:05pm by David Farrar

Large livestock may be excluded from waterways

Farmers may be compelled to exclude plains and lowland-dwelling dairy cattle and pigs from waterways by 2017, and beef cattle and deer by 2025.

The recommendation is one of 60 from the Land and Water Forum, which presented its report to the Government on Friday.

Members on the forum come from environment and recreation groups, industry, iwi, officials and scientists.

This is the same forum that the Fish and Game Council puled out of, because they said it was too pro-farmer. They look rather silly now.

Federated Farmers representative on the forum, Chris Allen, said the move to exclude stock should not come as a surprise to farmers. Already some regional councils use such controls.

Sheep are not included in the recommendation.

At this week’s council meeting, Federated Farmers had discussed the issue and largely accepted the recommendations.

Good to see.

Green Party spokeswoman Catherine Delahunty said the report was not about improving water quality, but about commercial interests being able to use water cheaply.

Really? Sounds rather knee-jerk.