• About this site|
• Site index|
• Contact us|
• Jobs

State of NZ's Environment 1997

Opening Section

1: Introduction

2: The Place and the People

3: Production and Consumption Patterns

4: Environmental Management

5: The State of Our Atmosphere

6: The State of Our Air

7: The State of Our Waters

8: The State of Our Land

9: The State of Our Biodiversity

10: Conclusions on the State of New Zealand's Environment

New Zealand's Environmental Legislation

There remains a large number of laws that touch on resource management (see Table 4.1). An outline of the major pieces of environmental legislation is set out below.

Resource Management Act 1991

By bringing together laws governing land, air and water resources, the Resource Management Act (RMA) introduces a totally new approach to environmental management. The Act's 'eco-system' approach recognises that elements of the environment do not stand alone, and that effects of human activities on the environment are not discrete.

Sustainable management

The Resource Management Act has a single, overarching purpose: to promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources. In the Act, 'sustainable management' means managing the use, development and protection of natural and physical resources in a way, or at a rate, which enables people and communities to provide for their social, economic and cultural well-being and for their health and safety while:

• sustaining the potential of natural and physical resources (excluding minerals) to meet the reasonably foreseeable needs of future generations;
• safeguarding the life-supporting capacity of air, water, soil and ecosystems; and
• avoiding, remedying, or mitigating any adverse effects on the environment.

This recognises that people need to use resources for their welfare, but that in doing so we must not, either singly or cumulatively, compromise the ability of the environment to continue to provide those resources, or other indirect services (such as erosion control) to the community.

The concept of sustainable management is derived from that of sustainable development. Sustainable development was coined in 1987 by the World Commission on Environment and Development (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987), and developed at the 1992 Rio 'Earth Summit' (see Box 4.4). It is a widely embracing concept, requiring environmental sustainability as well as economic viability and social justice.

In comparison, the concept of sustainable management in the Resource Management Act leaves the pursuit of economic and social goals to other mechanisms available to government and the community, e.g. our taxation and welfare systems. While recognising that there are social and economic consequences from the use of resources, the Act attempts to ensure that the environment's sustainability is not compromised by the pursuit of those concerns.

Effects-based approach

The RMA's approach differs from the approach of previous legislation by concentrating on the environmental effects of human activities, rather than on the activities themselves. This means that, regardless of who carries out an activity, it is the environmental effects that result from the activity that are the determining factor as to whether the activity is permitted in any particular location. It also means that, if a particular industrial activity can meet a community's environmental standards, that business should be able to operate in the area. Resource users must consider how their activity will affect the environment.

Focusing on environmental outcomes rather than activities also provides incentives for resource users to come up with efficient and creative ways to achieve good environmental results. People can be rewarded for devising new ways to use resources while promoting environmental sustainability.

Management controls

The Resource Management Act embodies three conceptually separate but related functions:

• it allocates access to, and use of,common property natural resources (fresh, coastal and ground water, geothermal energy and water, the surface of lakes and rivers, riverbeds, the foreshore and the seabed);
• it controls the discharge of contaminants (pollutants) to air, land and all water including ground, fresh and coastal water; and
• it manages the adverse affects of all activities using land, air, or water.

The RMA sets out a series of duties and restrictions. Under the Act, everyone has a duty to avoid, remedy, or mitigate adverse effects on the environment, notwithstanding the requirements of consent permits. The duties and restrictions also mean that nobody can use natural resources such as water, air or the coast unless the RMA or a consent under it says so.

No-one may discharge any contaminant to water or onto land in a way which might enter water. In the case of air and land discharges, any person operating industrial or trade premises is prohibited from discharging any contaminant without a consent (permit).

Although the presumption for the use of natural common property resources is very strict, the ropposite applies to the use of private land. Here, activities such as the right to erect a building, are deemed to be permitted unless constrained by provisions in statutory plans under the Act.

Responsibilities

Responsibilities for environmental decision making under the Act are allocated to the community most closely affected by the use of that resource. A decision is therefore made by the community that will deal with the effects and that can best understand the environmental issues at stake. This means that the government, and district and regional authorities, are required to identify the environmental risks in their area, and develop policy statements and plans containing ways to regulate activities in response to those threats. These plans and policies are constructed in a hierarchy, depending on the degree of action needed to address the perceived threat. (see Figure 4.3) Regional councils and territorial authorities use a common process for developing all plans and policy statements.

Central government can develop national policy statements and environmental standards to address environmental issues affecting the whole nation (such as management of the coastal zone or minimum ambient air quality to protect health -see Box 4.2). The government's statements and standards set policy boundaries from which local authorities develop their own policies and regulations.

Under the Act, Regional councils are charged with achieving 'integrated management of the natural and physical resources of the region'. Each council is required to draft a Regional Policy Statement identifying environmental issues and responses of significance for its region. It must also draft and administer a Regional Coastal Plan and may draft and administer other regional plans. All regional policy statements and plans must be drafted so they 'are not inconsistent' with any national policy statements or environmental standards in place at the time.

Regional councils also have responsibility for granting resource consents to occupy the coast; to carry out activities in river beds; to use natural water including underground, geothermal and coastal waters; to discharge contaminants to air, water or land; and to control certain activities on land for the purposes of soil conservation, hazard mitigation, and to protect the quantity and quality of natural water in accordance with the provisions of the Act, the Regional Policy Statement, and any regional plans.

Under the Resource Management Act, territorial authorities are charged with achieving "integrated management of the effects of the use, development, or protection of land and associated natural and physical resources of the district" (emphasis added). Territorial authorities must draft district plans identifying environmental issues of significance relating to land use for the district, and setting down any restrictions and controls on land use and subdivision taking into account the issues identified in the Regional Policy Statements and any regional plans that affect that area, and in national policy statements or environmental standards.

The territorial authorities also grant resource consents for subdivision of land and for activities on land where these have been determined as necessary in the district plan in accordance with the provisions of the Act and the district plan.

Analysis of alternative mechanisms

The Resource Management Act does not presume regulation is the only, or necessarily the best, way of dealing with environmental problems. Built into it is a requirement for decision-makers to carry out an appropriate assessment of alternative mechanisms. These include providing information, undertaking works and services, providing subsidies and the use of economic instruments-for example, tradeable water permits.

The Act sets a strict requirement that, before adopting a policy statement or plan or national environmental standard, decision-makers under the Act must analyse the alternative means of achieving the environmental outcomes sought, and choose the most cost effective one (or combination) in the circumstances.

Consents

The RMA has a common process for all consents, whether for land, subdivision, water, the coast, or the discharge of contaminants.

Rules in plans also provide for the degree and type of scrutiny of proposals for resource consents (permits). There are five levels of consents: permitted, controlled, discretionary, non-complying and prohibited. Anyone proposing an action requiring a consent must carry out an impact assessment of the effects of that proposal. Plans can set out the particular impacts that the community wishes to examine and control. If there is no plan, or if the plan does not contain environmental criteria, the applicant must ensure that all adverse impacts on the environment are identified and measures to avoid, remedy or mitigate them are identified and developed.

Where a proposal needs more than one consent, these will be dealt with concurrently and by a joint hearing where necessary. This mechanism applies within and between agencies also.

Monitoring

The RMA requires local authorities to monitor:

• the state of the environment in their jurisdiction or area;
• whether their policy statements or plans are working as intended;
• whether resource consents and their related conditions are being properly carried out.

Where this monitoring indicates a discrepancy from the original target, the local authority must act to resolve this-either by changing the target or the measures needed to achieve compliance.

For further information about the RMA, see Ministry for the Environment, 1994b, 1994c, 1994d, 1994e.

Crown Minerals Act 1991

The Crown Minerals Act controls mining rights to Crown-owned minerals. It deals with the allocation of property rights. It establishes minerals programmes and sets royalty regimes for the various mineral ores. Permits are granted for prospecting, exploring and mining in accordance with these programmes and subject to the royalty regimes and appropriate conditions.

Three permissions are required before mining can start:

• a right to the mineral resource
• a right to access to the land on which or under which the mining will take place
• environmental consents to carry out the activity.

A mining permit does not confer any right to access-this must be negotiated between the permit holder and the landowner. In the case of Crown land, access conditions are determined in accordance with the legislation under which the land is being managed.

The Resource Management Act controls the environmental effects resulting from the use of those rights. Mineral depletion is therefore exempt from the sustainability provisions of the RMA, but the environmental impacts of the mining and use of minerals on other resources may be addressed under the RMA.

Environment Act 1986

The Environment Act 1986 established the Ministry for the Environment and authorised appointment of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. In addition to establishing these new administrative agencies, it entrenched the Government's commitment to include environmental issues as a key element in its policy-making formula. One of its objectives is to ensure that, in the management of natural and physical resources, full and balanced account is taken of:

• the intrinsic values of ecosystems
• all values which are placed by individuals and groups on the quality of the environment
• the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi
• the sustainability of natural and physical resources
• the needs of future generations.

Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996

The passing of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act in June 1996 represents one of the most significant reforms of environmental legislation since the Resource Management Act. The Act has a strong focus on environmental protection, although the actual level of environmental and human health protection will be set through regulations yet to be developed. The Act establishes the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA) to assess and decide on applications to introduce hazardous substances or new organisms into New Zealand.

Biosecurity Act 1993

The Biosecurity Act was introduced in 1993 to restate and reform the laws relating to pests and unwanted organisms. It covers the quarantine, importation and monitoring of pests and unwanted organisms, and provides for pest management through regional or national pest management strategies. Any minister can recommend development of a national pest management strategy for an organism that is a pest 'of national importance', and regional councils can propose a strategy for controlling pests 'of regional importance'.

Criteria for identifying the need for a strategy are not just environmental; they include considerations of economic well-being, cultural concerns, as well as the viability of rare or endangered species, soil structure and water quality. The Act provides for cost-benefit analyses to be made of the pest's potential impacts before strategies are implemented. The roles and responsibilities of land-owners, regional councils and others and the cost-sharing for the management of the pest are then allocated on the basis of the nature and extent of the threats posed by the pest.

Conservation Act 1987

The Conservation Act 1987 establishes the Department of Conservation, and defines its mandate for managing and promoting the conservation of New Zealand's natural and historic resources on Crown-owned land. These resources include plants and animals; the air, water and soil they live upon or within; landscapes and landforms; and historic resources as defined under the Historic Places Act 1980. The Act sets up a system of land protection, and describes the variety of lands held for conservation purposes. These include ecological, sanctuary or wilderness areas and conservation parks. The Act also makes the Department of Conservation responsible for managing the recreational and tourist use of natural and historic resources within the protected estate.

Fisheries Act 1996

The Fisheries Act 1996 implements a system for ensuring sustainability of New Zealand's fishing resources. The Act aims to provide for the use, conservation, enhancement and development of fisheries resources so that people can provide for their social, economic and cultural well-being while:

• ensuring that the potential of those resources to meet the foreseeable needs of future generations is maintained; and
• avoiding, remedying or mitigating any adverse effects of fishing on the aquatic environment.

The Act therefore incorporates sustainability as its underlying principle. This means that the long-term viability of stocks for each species, the biological diversity of the aquatic environment, and human interests in using fishing resources are all considerations under the management system. A Quota Management System provides for the sustainability of fisheries resources. Under this system, the Minister of Fisheries can put in place fishing quotas for specific stock.

Under the Act, a Total Allowable Catch is set for species managed under the Quota Management System (covering commercial, recreational and traditional Māori fishing activity). This is reviewed annually for each species covered by the system. From this, a Total Allowable Commercial Catch (TACC) is established and commercial fishers acquire rights to harvest fish by purchasing or leasing Individual Transferable Quotas (ITQs). ITQs are expressed as a proportion of the TACC for each fishery, and therefore change as the TACC increases or decreases in response to the assessed health of the fishery.

Forests Amendment Act 1993

The 1993 amendments to the Forests Act 1949 affected the management of natural forests. The Amendment does not apply to land controlled by the Department of Conservation, but applies to most other private and public natural forests. Its purpose is to promote the sustainable forestry management of indigenous forest land. The Act defines sustainable forestry management as "the management of an area of indigenous forest land in a way that maintains the ability of the forest growing on that land to continue to provide a full range of products and amenities in perpetuity while retaining the forest's natural values". It requires areas of natural forest available for timber production to be managed under sustainable management plans defining, among other things, rates of harvest calculated on the forest's capacity for regeneration. It also provided for unsustainable logging in natural forests to be phased out by July 1996.

Wildlife Act 1953

This is the main law protecting wildlife on land and in New Zealand's territorial waters. It provides that wildlife sanctuaries, management reserves and refuges can be established for the protection of wildlife and their habitats. Species are classed under schedules to the Act according to their need for protection.

Ozone Layer Protection Amendment Act 1996

The 1990 Ozone Layer Protection Act was amended in June 1996 to bring New Zealand's ozone laws up to date with changes to the Montreal Protocol. Instead of specifying particular controls, the new Act enables controls to be imposed through regulations. This means that it is now easier to meet changing obligations under the Protocol. The new Act also sets up a system for accreditation of workers dealing with ozone-depleting substances. This will require these workers to have sufficient technical knowledge to comply with their obligations under the new Act.