Federated Farmers: Roading - a vital rural artery

ROAD ANGST: Ruapehu district, like many provinces, is facing increasing challenges due to the degradation of rural roads -a vital artery to the community's long term well-being.

Did you know central Government has a directive of doubling primary-sector exports by 2025? I'm encouraged by the support shown to an industry which I have been a passionate and dedicated part of for many years.

And, I'm genuinely excited at the potential role the mighty King Country could play in helping to achieve that goal.

Living in beautiful, peaceful, remote valleys in Ruapehu, our meat and wool are grown naturally on grass covered hills and river flats but access has always been an issue.

Because of the distance and nature of the environment our farms are not picture perfect, like the well developed properties you may see driving down the main state highways.

Costs of inputs are higher, and we are vulnerable to weather events, while the ability to fund improvements means that budgets are always tight.

This brings us to our rural roads and bridges, our regions' arteries. Without them we are producers with no market.

The 28 years I have lived down the end of an 18km metal track it's not uncommon to have no access for sometimes up to 10 days. But the roads don't only serve the farming community. Increasingly we have tourist busses and campervans enjoying our rural scene and more recently cyclists have been encouraged to venture onto the network.

Larger trucks are putting more pressure on maintenance and we are facing the prospect of pine plantations, planted in the 1980s with government encouragement, ready for harvest.
Add to this the 50 per cent of the land in the district is administered by the Department of Conservation (DOC) who don't pay rates at all and you can see the dilemma.

Roads are funded partly by our rates and partly by government subsidies (called the FAR rate). I applaud our local council for managing the extensive roading infrastructure under a tight budget, but this has come at a cost which is mainly the failure to replace or adequately maintain the bridges or make major improvements to the roads.

But the prospect of even maintaining the status quo is now under threat.

The Government has been working on a change to the FAR rate, which in real terms will mean the loss of one million dollars annually (or as the council is suggesting, an 8 per cent increase in our rates for the next 10 years).

To many, one million dollars might not seem a lot, especially when you consider the billions being spent on the 'roads of national significance' or used to improve Auckland commuters time to work. But for a district like Ruapehu it is a significant amount of money with significant implications.

We have been warned that the council is looking at cost savings such as closing roads and leaving them for individuals to manage, not replacing seal (though most of the roads are metal anyway), with road tolls and local charges similar to GST.

Current restrictions on some bridges means that local trucking firms are losing business and basic farm maintenance like tracks and even fertiliser is limited. For the primary sector to reach the growth potential identified by central government, fresh thinking as to how the roading dollar is spent is needed to ensure vital arterial links are maintained.

At the moment, Ruapehu and other remote agricultural regions are severely hamstrung by fragile road networks.