Public hearings into a controversial plan to reduce nutrient runoff into Lake Rotorua have started.
The hearings, for proposed Plan Change 10 to the Bay of Plenty Regional Council's Regional Water and Land Plan, are scheduled for two weeks and started yesterdayat the Millennium Hotel in Rotorua.
Retired District and Environment Court judge Gordon Whiting is chairman of the independent hearing panel and was joined on the panel by Rauru Kirikiri, Gina Sweetman and Dr Brent Cowie.
Proposed Plan Change 10 covers rules to limit the amount of nitrogen entering Lake Rotorua from land use. The rules will affect rural properties in the Lake Rotorua Catchment.
But, before oral presentations from submitters got underway, representatives for Federated Farmers were told that more than 1000 pages of evidence it believed to be from non-expert witnesses was actually deemed to be from experts.