Computer says no!

Farmers should have submitted data for their respective farms by July 31.

However, regional councils are asking farmers to wait until the new national reporting systems are available. The web portal is now expected to go live from August 29 and councils say “no follow up action” will be taken against farmers until October.

Federated Farmers says it appears the Government did not engage necessary web developers until the eleventh hour.

Feds essential freshwater regulations spokesman Colin Hurst told Rural News, as it stands today, the law states that dairy farmers must submit fertiliser data to regional councils by July 31 this year.

“Federated Farmers finds it astonishing that councils would write to farmers and ask them to just wait a few months before they complied,” he says

The new regulation is part of the Ministry for the Environment’s (MfE) essential freshwater policy.

Hurst says the failure to deliver the online tool on time should also be seen in the broader context of the Government’s freshwater package. He claims the 2020 freshwater package contained a number of complicated and frankly unworkable regulations.

“It has put the ministry and regional councils under a lot of pressure. None of the regulations have been implemented without incident so far.”

Federated Farmers has written to the minister, David Parker, seeking an amendment to delay the reporting date for the 2021-22 year to the end of 2022.

“We don’t think it’s fair to ask people to be in breach of the law, no one wants to be put in that position,” says Hurst.

Regional and Unitary Councils NZ land monitoring group lead Richard Saunders told Rural News that developing the tools has taken longer than expected. “By working together, the regional sector and the fertiliser industry has ensured that there is a consistent approach to data calculation and submission across the three tools developed to date.”

Saunders says while the intent was to have the system ready for 31 July, developing these tools has taken longer than expected.

“It is important we are confident that these tools will operate as intended when farmers begin to use them,” he adds. “No follow up action will be taken until after October, as we are encouraging farmers to wait until the new system is available to submit their data.”

He says councils have agreed that the focus, following ‘go live’, will be to engage with farmers to encourage them to complete their reporting.