Policies for soil conservation in New Zealand: The institutional setting

Abstract

This report comprises part of a research project commissioned by the Ministry for the Environment as part of the 1989/90 Environmental Research Agenda. The proposal arose from changes to water and soil administration which placed responsibility for problems in soil and water management with regional government. Land management as a regional responsibility requires new types of institutional arrangements through which communities minimise and ameliorate the adverse consequences of land management practices. The research has the objective of identifying and evaluating new options that will align and make explicit costs and benefits of land management practice. A companion report has been produced by a visiting Fulbright Scholar, Professor John Braden, titled Policies for soil conservation in New Zealand: options for Government. The two reports develop independent approaches to the problem water and soil management poses for policy but in terms of emphasis the two reports complement one another. The emphasis in this report is on the institutional setting within which soil conservation policies operate. The emphasis in Professor Braden's report is on the policy instruments that can be applied by government agencies to problems in water and soil management.