According to the information the Bill amends the legislation governing aquaculture – the Resource Management Act 1991, Fisheries Act 1996, the Maori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement Act 2004 and the Aquaculture Reform (Repeal and Transitional Provisions) Act 2004. Te Ururoa Flavell, MP for Waiariki, told that the bill corrects technical issues and provides some assistance in amending experimental areas outside of the Aquaculture Management Areas – known more usually as AMAs.
It is said that the bill also amends the Maori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement Act 2004 by revising the definition of new space. According to Te Ururoa Flavell the previous amendments to the aquaculture legislation was not sufficient. He added that the key point is that the aquaculture is going to be too significant a feature of the fishing industry in the future for Maori to be excluded at this point.
It is also mention that the Regional Councils need to be consistent in the way in which they respond to aquaculture management areas. The Maori said that they need to have clear and consistent management which will oversee the issue of the quality of representative space for allocation to iwi. It is noted that the prevailing concern is that tangata whenua will end up with marine farming areas which are not likely to yield a higher than average productive capacity.
It has been cleared that the Maori organisations have already been playing a crucial role in the marine farming industry as we know. The central challenge facing Government could be how to ensure the sector is able to respond to the economic and environmental aspirations of iwi.
