Irrigation Scheme Backers Battle To Salvage Rights
April 20th, 2009
The Central Plains Water Trust (CPWT) has been granted time to build a case to keep the resource application open after the commissioners hearing the resource consent application made clear the Waianiwaniwa dam and reservoir, central to the scheme, will be declined. A hearing is to be held on May 11 which will be the decider for the scheme to irrigate 60,000 ha of farmland. The CPWT wants to ensure it at least gains rights to take water from the lower Waimakariri and Rakaia rivers. Agriculture Minister, David Carter, says the scheme’s long journey to this point “does provide justification for us dramatically reforming the Resource Management Act.”
Carter is awaiting the final report from the Canterbury Strategic Water Study, to set priorities for the region’s irrigation projects. He put a June 30 deadline on when they met before Christmas, giving a hurry-up to a process which has ambled on for seven years and is currently out for feedback from stakeholder groups and public consultation. Armed with the study, Carter says it will “then be a matter of leadership from central Govt” to push the preferred schemes to fruition.
The CPWT is now considering whether the scheme will be viable with a series of small water storage facilities along its length, fed by the Waimakariri and Rakaia. The commissioners says they have reached “a tentative conclusion” water could be taken from the two rivers though at lesser rates and volumes than has been applied for.
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