4. Planning & Allocation of Water

During the 1970s and 1980s the Waitaki Catchment Commission prepared a number of reports and plans referring to water allocation, including undertaking a project to assist in the re-evaluation of the 1966 allocation due in 1988. None of the plans had a statutory basis in the way such plans have under the Resource Management Act.

4.1. Resources Survey and Provisional Water Allocation Plan

The September 1977 Waitaki Regional Water Board issued The Resources and Usage of Water in the Mackenzie-Omarama District report which looked at the allocation of water for irrigation. It concluded that:

“The area of land suitable for irrigation, if fully developed, would create a demand on waters of National Importance greater than the 14.72 m3/sec granted by the Order in Council of 18 August 1969. In the long term, the potential demand has been assessed at 25.71 m3/sec.”

This report lists the water takes for irrigation.

The Waitaki Regional Water Board also prepared a Provisional Water Allocation Plan in response to a NWASCO request for a plan of allocation as the water available from the canals is limited to 520 cusecs and considerable capital expenditure will be involved in delivering the water to the farmers. This Provisional Plan and any updates have not been sighted, although correspondence disputing the content between the Waitaki Catchment Commission and NWASCO has.

4.2. 1982 Waitaki Water and Soil Resource Management Plan

Volume 1 of the Plan contained the Waitaki CC’s objectives and policies for the catchment. The key objectives made it “clear that the water of the catchment was not to be seen as exclusively or even primarily for hydro-electricity generation but to be a mix of uses. However, the plan did recognise that most of the waters of the Upper Waitaki … had already been declared “Waters of National Importance” for power production, with specified quantities set aside for irrigation of stock and domestic water supply. The policies that followed from these objectives required that a Water Allocation Plan be prepared to allocate “each unit of water resource” to remove possible conflicts.”[20]

4.3. Preparing for the Re-evaluation of the 1966 Water Allocation

In late 1983 the Waitaki CC and the Centre for Resource Management jointly started a project to obtain information to assist and recommendations to management for strategies suitable for operating the Waitaki system. The driver was the allocation made in 1966 becoming due for re-evaluation in 1988. The Preface to Volume 1 of a July 1986 draft of An Analytical Approach to Water Allocation in the Upper Waitaki by the Centre for Resource Management notes a number of technological developments and changes in management practise have occurred in irrigation and agriculture since the original allocations were made. The Preface notes that current estimates of land suited to irrigation vary widely but are in excess of 40,000 hectares (cf 20,000 hectares in the Interdepartmental Committee’s Report 1966), with corresponding expected increases in carrying capacity and stock water requirements.

4.4. In Summary

During the 1970s and 1980s the Waitaki Catchment Commission prepared a number of reports and plans referring to water allocation, including undertaking a project to assist in the re-evaluation of the 1966 allocation due in 1988. The reports and plans indicate the Commission’s ongoing consideration of the allocation in the 1969 Order in Council.

20 Unpublished Report Number U:03/70 Waitaki River Catchment Water Allocation Management Environment Canterbury 24 September 2003