Water certainty good for business and environment, say farmers

From left, Miles McBain, Hugh Ritchie, and Simon White, farmers from Otane in Central Hawke's Bay.

The security of water supply that the Ruataniwha Water Storage Scheme would bring would transform farming in Central Hawke's Bay with the benefits flowing on to the community, say three Otane farmers keen to see the project go ahead.

Miles McBain runs a sheep and beef fattening and cropping unit in the Drumpeel/Te Aute Trust Rd area.

He said he was not irrigating at the moment, but could see the potential a consistent water supply would bring to his operation.

"For me it was looking across the fence and seeing how consistent the neighbours could be with their irrigation on crops year after year.

"During last year's very dry summer I could not do anything about it - I just had to cross my fingers and hope for rain - my peas were too late and were two to three tonnes back on what they would have been.

"If I had irrigation I would have been able to apply the right amount of water at critical times and got through easier."

He said with secure water he could increase production, including more intensive cropping, but as it was he did not have a lot of options.

"It all comes back to water - I can continue as I am without irrigation but I can't progress and push my farm the way I want to and make the most of the opportunities."

Simon White farms in the same area, also fattening sheep and beef as well as running arable cropping.

He said he was irrigating some areas of his farm at the moment, with the aid of on-farm water storage, but the dry land areas of the property added a huge risk to the business and the environment.

In terms of the environment, he said irrigation allowed water to be applied to his crops at the correct time to enhance the plants' nutrient uptake and thus prevent excessive leaching.

It also gave the companies he supplied, and consumers, certainty to fulfil contracts and supply what customers wanted.

"With more water we would develop some of the dry country growing processed vegetable or seed crops because of the certainty irrigation would bring."

Critics of the scheme have asked why farmers could not have on-farm water storage as an alternative, but Mr White said dams such as the one on his property would not work for everyone being dependent on the right topography.

It also needed large financial outlays because of the size needed to store adequate capacity.

In addition, with on-farm water storage in riverbed areas, the cost would increase three-fold because such dams would need to be lined, he said.

At Drumpeel Rd Hugh Ritchie, who runs crops as well as sheep and beef, had been successfully irrigating since 2000, but the added water security of the dam would enable expansion of his operation's footprint.

Currently taking from groundwater, he said this resource was limited and increased irrigation would mean that rather than, for example, being forced to plant a crop while it was wet, he could wait for the right conditions and not worry about running out of moisture in four to five weeks.

"If you are going to invest in irrigation you need reliability to make a profit to put back into the business - it also gives us the option to get things growing earlier and into the market earlier."

Like Mr White, he said the benefits of this water consistency meant you could prevent crops getting stressed and ensure they were utilising nutrients rather than leaching, bringing environmental benefits as well as commercial.

Although there was speculation as to the future of the project given the recent Supreme Court ruling against the Department of Conservation land swap, Mr Ritchie was confident the scheme would still go ahead.

"The law will be looked at again - there will be some pragmatic decisions around swapping land and that will bring the dam back into play again."