"Perhaps the farmers could start by paying a little bit for each litre of our water they use (apparently it takes thousands of litres of water to make 1 litre of milk) and this money could be put aside for the inevitable cleanup job or to offset the cost of the expensive water treatment plants that will be needed."

How sadly naive. Exactly who do you think is going to bear the cost of any increase in the cost of producing dairy products? Not the farmers. Not Fonterra. It's going to be the consumers.

Dairy farming has a massive impact on the environment. The industry is solely focused on gouging as much money out of the global economy in as short a term as possible.

Pie-in-the-sky suggestions like yours only serve to detract from any credible, enviromentally focused arguments for responsible resource management.

Non sequitur, Paul. Consumers pay for everything that taxpayers don't pay for. When consumers stop paying, businesses stop producing.

What's your definition of responsible resource management?

Hi Paul

Dairy farmers take a public resource and turn it into a private profit. You, as a taxayer, will be footing the bill to clean this up. You, as a ratepayer will be footing the bill to clean this up. You, as taxpayer are already footing the bill for the Kyoto obligations, incurred by our dairy farmers. And, you are obviously happy for this to continue.

Naive ? Yes - sadly I think you are.

Ideological twaddle, David.

Farmers pay for their land, their stock, services and equipment. They contribute taxes to the common pool, rainwater to your rivers and aquifers and absorb greenhouse gases with their pastures and shelter belts.

And they didn't vote for your Government that signed up to this Kyoto nonsense in the pathetic delusion that NZ was going to reap a crop of nett carbon credits.

PS: Check out the relative rate burden paid by farmers in rural districts before you next winge about ratepayer contributions too, Dave.

Alan, how the hell do farmers "absorb greenhouse gases with their pastures and shelter belts". What a load of "twaddle" that is!

To keep their farms producing they apply fertilizer by the tonne then put cows on it which burp and fart green house gasses also by the tonne. To even begin to suggest that farms sequester green house gases is completely irresponsible and I think you know this.

The author of the article is really trying to say that a farmer should be responsible for their emissions and start paying for the real cost of the environmental destruction their farms contribute to. It's funny how I keep reading about Fonterra upping dairy farmers pay packets, yet don't read much on the farmers being asked to contribute some of this money to making farming sustainable.

Secondly, how the hell do farmers contribute "rainwater to your rivers and aquifers"??? Water comes to their farms clean, and leaves full of cow poo and fertilizer. I don't see that as a contribution. Ask the people who can't swim in the Rotorua lakes anymore because of this run off and see if they think farms contribute clean water to their lakes.

Never insult a farmer with your mouth full, Brent.

I aren't insulting farmers Jane - I am just saying that like everyone else, they should be responible for the environmental impacts they cause.

Some farmers do an excellent job of keeping stock and fertilizers out of our waterways, managing water supply and application of chemicals to their farms. Sadly, many do not either have the skills or desire to do any of this and cause some serious environmental damage. Federated Farmers should step up and sort this out, their "10 in 10" campaign is a start but appears to be lacking in long term committment, incentives for farmers and is rather lacklustre (dropping runoff by 10% over 10 years??? How bout by 50% over 10 years?).

Farming is the backbone of NZ's economy and currently dairy farmers are receiving whopping payouts. Maybe we should ask them to clean up their acts while the payouts are high - they now have the resources to do so.

Like David's, most of your comments were silly generalisations, Brent.

Pastures and shelter belts turn CO2 into wood, grass and soil. Some may use a lot of fertilizer but many don't.

Every atom of carbon burped by cattle first was taken out of the atmosphere by the pasture which is further enriched by the poo you decry - actually the most natural fertiliser. It is simply being recycled.

Most of the water falling on farms passes through far less polluted than that falling on city streets. If you want to see pollution, look out your own window.

Oh OK Alan. So if what you say is true, farms are net green house gas contributors, they actually have no effect on net emissions. Hmmm. Strange how farming is included in the emissions trading scheme then huh? Wonder how it got on there...

The poo that I decry isn't the problem. The problems are simple. A lot of farmers decide that keeping stock away from streams running through their property isn't necessary. Putting shelter belts around streams isn't necessary because it reduces the size of their pastures. The pastures that cows eat are intesively grown through the use of fertilizers which they eat and hence poo out. Not before they get absorbed into the cows system and then are eaten by humans through milk and meat. Poo gets washed into streams due to improper pasture drainage when it does rain, washes down stream into our lakes and sea - ta daaa algae blooms. It's not rocket science.

You are right. Some farmers do use a lot of fertilizer and some do not. But some people commit crime and others do not. The ones that do commit crime are caught and punished. The farmers that overuse their fertilizer and pasture lands are... well, nothing happens to them. The farmers that use more than their fair share of water? Nothing. In fact they usually get a short term gain from higher yeilds. Then they are free to sell off their farms once they have taken as much from the land as possible. Under this system, doing the wrong thing is encouraged. That's not very good environmental stewardship.