Fisheries spokesman, Phil Heatley informed that the marine farming industry will get the boost it needs to fulfil its billion-dollar potential under National’s aquaculture and fisheries policy announced. He added that the aquaculture sector was first strangled by years of moratoria and now, 1,351 days after Labour’s reforms, no significant Aquaculture Management Area (AMA) has been created where marine farming did not already exist. Labour’s record speaks for itself.
It is said that their reforms of the sector have created nothing but red tape and frustration – particularly to Maori. According to National aquaculture can be a billion-dollar industry with some strict recommendations. These include improvement in the legislative framework and acknowledge that the industry-led review findings will need to contribute to this. Allowing aquaculture research to be considered outside AMAs, and remove the veto of the Minister of Conservation over restricted coastal activities.
The new policy will allow farmers to change the species farmed in an area, where the two species are broadly similar, without an arduous bureaucratic process. It will also reduce the bureaucracy and cost to applicants who undertake a private plan change to create an AMA. National also promises to free up the bureaucracy which is strangling the Quota Management System (QMS).
It is said that National will remove all administrative, operational, and policy focus that is unnecessary and redirect these resources into the research and monitoring of fish-stock health. These funds ill be used to improve frontline fishery officer policing in order to fight poaching. Heatley informed that National will amend the ETS legislation to provide for a 90% allocation for fishing.
