Philippa Stevenson: Murky water sends message about degrading waterways

Trout fishing in Lake Rotoiti is the best it's been in years but the anglers are staying away in droves.

Sales of Fish and Game fishing licences for the eastern region, which covers the Rotorua lakes, were down by 7.5 per cent in the year ended September. But those who took to their waders or boats at Lake Rotoiti, particularly, came home with the best catches in around five seasons.

Region manager Steve Smith says while Rotorua locals continued hauling in the trout, news of the lakes' toxic algal blooms had deterred anglers from further afield.

The blooms make the water murky but don't otherwise worry the fish. People, however, are advised to take precautions with water contact. Those warnings were enough to overshadow the good news about the fishing, and the absence of Auckland anglers alone is estimated to have cost the Rotorua economy $1 million.

To Fish and Game chairman Sandy Lawrie, the contradiction of plentiful fish but fewer anglers is a sign of worse to come if the growing degradation of waterways isn't addressed.

A perception that the fishing would be poor kept people away. Other perceptions - real or not - could spread and damage the country's tourism industry just as it's becoming our biggest earner, he says.

Yesterday, the Fish and Game leader joined representatives of three other conservation and recreation groups on the banks of the Waikato River to launch a campaign highlighting the issue.

Forest and Bird, Federated Mountain Clubs and the Recreational Canoeists Association have also signed on to the Living Rivers Coalition, whose springboard was Fish and Games' two-year-old Dirty Dairying campaign.

Forest and Bird conservation manager Kevin Hackwell hopes the timing of the campaign launch will give food for thought as people pitch camp by rivers and lakes.

There's certainly been plenty to chew over on the issue in recent months.

In July, a report by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research on 229 lowland waterways found 95 per cent had bacteria levels exceeding Ministry of Health guidelines - half were more than five times over.

In October, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment released a stocktake of the increasing intensification of farming. Our water resource was limited, fragile and under growing pressure from farm activities affecting quality and supply, it said.

More than half the estimated 2 billion cubic metres of water consumed each year is used in irrigation, and the irrigated land area is doubling each decade.

Also placing demands on waterways are existing and proposed hydroelectric power schemes. The Ministry of Economic Development recently identified 65 rivers as suitable for dams.

Lawrie, who is also Environment BoP deputy chief, well knows the balancing act between conservation and economic considerations.

MAF, for instance, recently valued the contribution of all irrigation to farmgate GDP at around $920 million.

"It's important there is a voice for this side [conservation] of the issue," he says of the Living Rivers Coalition.

Regional councils, which are responsible for making decisions on the allocation and use of water, have suffered from an absence of direction from Government, and the Resource Management Act has been applied patchily, Lawrie says.

Prompted by such shortcomings, the Environment Ministry this month issued a discussion paper, Freshwater for a Sustainable Future, which examines ways to improve freshwater management.

You know it's not just the water that is murky when the discussion document highlights that water is "over-allocated in some catchments, is not consistently allocated to its higher value use over time, and can be wasted".

Nor is it hard to grasp the challenge ahead when it also states that "individual water bodies may have nationally important values that are under threat. However, nationally important values have not yet been identified."

It's time to let the ministry know our values. Submissions close on March 18.