Dirty dairying

In New Zealand "dirty dairying" refers to damage to the ecological health of New Zealand's freshwater environment by the intensification of dairy farming, and also to the high profile campaign begun in 2002 by the Fish and Game Council to highlight and combat this.

The campaign led to the creation in 2003 of the Dairying and Clean Streams Accord, a voluntary agreement between Fonterra, Ministry for the Environment, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and regional councils. In 2014 the Dairying and Clean Streams Accord was succeeded by the Sustainable Dairying: Water Accord.

Intensive dairy farming practices has led to water pollution from cattle effluent in many of the streams and rivers in New Zealand. The Waikato River has had a long history of water pollution and now fails health regulations for human contact. It passes through the highly productive Waikato Region, where dairy farming is a common land use. More recently, the Manawatu River has been highlighted in the media due to its high pollution levels. Lake Ellesmere has suffered from eutrophication since the 1970s due to farming activities in the area, Lake Taupo has had government funding to curb pollution, and the Rotorua lakes are heavily polluted. A study using water quality data from 1996 to 2002 found that the vast majority of lowland rivers and streams passing through pastoral land were polluted.

There have been a number of prosecutions for dirty dairying. Over a four-year period from July 2008 until June 2012 at least 151 prosecutions involving 300 charges were made for unlawful discharges of dairy effluent. Environment Court fines collected for the period totalled $NZ$3.2 million.

Some notable cases include:

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