'Dirty' farmers in firing line

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Two brothers at the head of a farming family which controls some of the North Island's biggest dairy farms, Allan and Frank Crafar, have been convicted over "dirty dairying".

The brothers – convicted of a series of offences relating to a poorly maintained farm effluent system – were today targeted by the Green Party, which has called on the Fonterra cooperative to use financial penalties against them.

Party co-leader Russel Norman said a 70-page decision by District Court Judge Laurie Newhook – who is also a judge in the Environment Court – made grim reading.

The Waikato Times reported the Reporoa-based brothers and their firm Hillside Farms Ltd were convicted on 34 of 40 charges resulting from the "systemic failure" of an effluent system on a Collins Rd farm southwest of Hamilton, between October 2007 and April 2008.

It is the latest in a series of court cases brought against the duo and Allan's wife, Elizabeth, who own numerous dairy farms in the central North Island.

Dr Norman last year called for courts to levy larger fines after the nation's biggest fine for a single dairy effluent discharge, $37,500, was imposed in the Environment Court at Napier over the Crafar Group's breach of resource consent on Taharua Farm, 40km southeast of Taupo.

Dr Norman said at the time that the 1.1 million kilograms of milksolids produced on that farm would have produced a dairy payout of roughly $5 million from a herd with a value of about $8 million, and a fine of $37,000 was not going to make a big dent in the profit margin.

In the latest case, Environment Waikato alleged the farm, operated by the family's firm in conjunction with sharemilker Ivan Lammas, had dairy effluent seeping from ponds, discharges from feed pads on to yards and land, discharges from a broken irrigator hose, overflows from sumps, over-irrigation of paddocks and after being urged to rectify effluent issues on the property, breaching an abatement notice.

Judge Newhook noted that the defendants' attempts to blame Mr Lammas "do not afford a successful defence", and the Crafars had "the ultimate duty to manage and control the situation on the farm".

Allan Crafar said he had not seen the judgment and had no comment to make.

But Dr Norman said dirty dairying was potentially damaging the nation's "clean and green" reputation and Fonterra needed to apply financial penalties to recidivist polluters.

"Fonterra claims to take water pollution seriously but. . . it's time for Fonterra to stand up for the good farmers by penalising the bad ones," he said.

It could also tell milk tankers not to collect from farms which illegally polluted rivers and streams, he said.

Fonterra's director of milk supply, Barry Harris, said after the Taharua case that most resource consent issues were minor, but in cases where farmers refused to lift their game, the cooperative could "fine" them or even refuse to take their milk.

"In a situation where we (believe) their continued non-compliance and the impact on the environment is sufficiently severe, we will take action," he said.

- NZPA