Freshwater quality is an intensely debated issue, both nationally and regionally. It’s worthy of serious discussion, but we shouldn’t lose sight of two important facts:
• The Taranaki Regional Council has been closely monitoring the quality of this region’s waterways for more than two decades.
• Improvements are increasingly apparent, thanks mainly to significant investment and effort by communities, farmers and industry.
This report covers the most recent findings of the Council’s extensive water quality monitoring programmes, which are designed to accepted protocols and subject to external review and audit to ensure their scientific integrity.
In a nutshell, the latest trends from more than 20 years of monitoring the ecological health and physical and chemical state of our rivers and streams show most measures are improving or not changing significantly. And the latest assessments of in-stream life – the primary indicator of water quality – are again the best since we began measuring.
The whole region continues to invest in measures to protect and enhance our waterways. The benefits are more and more apparent, and the Council is firmly focused on working with the community to achieve further improvements.
For a summary of the latest results go to www.trc.govt.nz/WaterwaysReport2017.pdf
- David MacLeod, Chairman, Taranaki Regional Council