Nicola Allan Supporter of Lakes-Murchison Ward

3 weeks ago

About time..

www.facebook.com/share/1DcTjVM9Lz/We’ve had a great win for farmers today, with the National Party announcing plans to cut the red tape around river gravel extraction and on-farm quarries.

This delivers on two of the 10 national permitted activity standards Federated Farmers called for in our 2026 Election Platform.

We’ve been saying for a long time that farmers need certainty and sensible rules, not different consenting regimes all over the country.

Today’s announcement is exactly the sort of practical reform we want to see more of.

Under the proposed national standard, farmers who meet clear conditions could extract gravel from rivers without needing a resource consent.

That matters not just for the gravel itself, but for flood protection.

We’ve seen what happens when gravel naturally builds up in our rivers, raising riverbeds and increasing flood risk.

It makes no sense that farmers can face significant hurdles to getting this work done, and recent flooding in North Canterbury and Wairarapa has shown what happens when rivers aren’t properly maintained.

As farmers, we also need aggregate on our properties for tracks, gateways, stock yards and other essential infrastructure. Yet many of us are now forced to buy it from elsewhere because consenting requirements make using a small on-farm quarry too costly or complicated.

We shouldn’t have to navigate an expensive and time-consuming consent process just to get gravel for a farm track or remove gravel from a river.

That’s why we’re really pleased with National’s plan for clear national rules that reduce cost, delay and uncertainty while maintaining strong environmental safeguards.

We’re making some good progress, but there’s plenty more work to do.

We want to see the same approach applied to the other eight areas in our 10 permitted activity standards: farm plans, vegetable growing, on-farm water storage, drain maintenance, effluent management, fertiliser application, wetland restoration, and small- and medium-scale solar.

Thanks so much again for backing Federated Farmers.

Today’s announcement shows what can be achieved when we keep pushing for practical changes to make farming easier and more productive. ... See MoreSee Less