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Executive Summary

Since 1997 the Ministry for the Environment has been involved with a number of initiatives relating to contaminated land.  Most notably:

  • 10 contaminated land guidelines have been developed
  • the Contaminated Sites Remediation Fund (CSRF) has been established, allocating $2.5 million/per year
  • contaminated land functions for councils and a definition of contaminated land have been added to the Resource Management Act 1991 (the RMA).

These initiatives have been very successful.  The guidelines are widely used by practitioners and are considered by them to be technically robust.  The CSRF has assisted in 33 projects, including the remediation of New Zealand’s worst contaminated site at Mapua.  Approximately 270 tonnes of agrichemicals have been collected and removed from rural properties across New Zealand.

This extensive suite of initiatives is almost entirely the result of the Ministry working in close partnership with local government and industry, to the extent that a number of these initiatives were driven by these groups.  However, there are still issues to address, including:

  • a widely variable approach to the management of contaminated land at the territorial and regional level
  • a lack of nationally consistent methods and numerical values for soil contaminants
  • barriers to identifying contaminated land and recording information about contaminated land.

Recognising the success of these previous initiatives, the Ministry wants to continue working together with our stakeholders to develop tools that are useful, technically robust and address these remaining issues.  This document forms the basis for a discussion on how to achieve a comprehensive policy framework for managing contaminated land, and we welcome your input.

How to have your say

Anyone can make a submission on this discussion paper.  Please include the following information:

  • your name, postal address, phone number, fax number and email address (if applicable)
  • your submission, with reasons for your views
  • any changes you would like made.

For your views to be considered, you must forward your submission to the Ministry for the Environment, PO Box 10-362, Wellington, or by email to standards@mfe.govt.nz, to be received no later than 5.00 pm on 28 February 2007.

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