· The NZ freshwater crisis indicators reveal the massive impact on freshwater and atmosphere of current intensive farming systems
· The $ cost (externalities) of intensive dairy farming exceed the income, and allowing these externalities are left to be absorbed by the rest of society and future generations they are effectively a subsidy
· This subsidy has been capitalised into land valuation and driven up farm debt as well as environmental impacts
· Worse still the capitalisation of the right to pollute into land values makes it so much harder for sustainable farmers/farming options to compete
· To achieve a sustainable farming future we must even the playing field
· The scale of change required to meet water and GHG emission reality is massive and it seems the Taupo/Rotorua example of buying back the right to pollute may be the only way to achieve sustainable food production
Freshwater for life 