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One World - One Health - One LifeAlison Dewes April 2016

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One World: One Health: One LifeProduction systems need to change to optimise wellbeing, - we are challenged today by

declining ecological health, climate change, increasing pressure, economic challenges,

especially on farms.

Economic models have driven farmers more to growth (output) + debt.

The new “think big/more” has not delivered wellbeing that it purported to.

Agricultural management needs a paradigm shift towards wellbeing (One World: One Health)

where increasing output and debt is replaced by increasing profit and health.

We can change our reliance on farm away from intensification, chemical and antibiotic debt to

more balanced, social and environmental welfare view. Trending towards chemical free

agriculture delivering safer - healthier food with lower impact with less stressed farmers.

It will take a holistic view not one solely to increase GDP which fails to count pollution and

public health costs.

As rural health professionals we can deliver on our responsibilities to safeguard people,

animals and ecosystems for present and future generations.

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“In 2025, I wonder if NZ could be a world leading conservation park working with nature to nourish the global village”

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…where farming and tourism lock hearts not horns

5Cousin Matt, rode the length of NZ on his mountain bike

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I want to ride the whole of the country & eat great NZ food all the way….

And swim in most places………

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…..meet cool people from all over, eat food grown on farms and feel an awesome NZ Story…..

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2016 – Farming and Tourism 9

Are we farming inside healthy limits?Economic – Ecological – Human - Intergenerational

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Some stuff isn't helpful: mixed messages are everywhere

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But Some Guys are Leading The Way

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What’s the Problem?

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Ag Growth Agenda is Testing Limits

• Business Growth Agenda

•Boost exports from 30% to 40% of GDP by 2025 (KPMG, 2013)

• Double rate of growth to 7% CAGR compared with 3% CAGR past 20 years. (Ridett Institute, 2010)

• Drive to Realise the Potential of 960000 Ha of Maori Owned Land(300,000 Ha class 4-6 land intensified to higher performance each year for next 3 years) (Price Waterhouse Coopers, 2013)

• Irrigation Infrastructure Fund (Govt + Crown Investment Schemes to Accelerate Water Storage + Irrigation: eg: 4-500,000 ha more irrigation around NZ

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Economic Agendas - GDP as the measure of success…• Government and Regions use GDP as their metric.

They show GDP impacts when a new regional plan is introduced.

• GDP only measures gross turnover( + jobs)at any point in time.

• GDP fails to measure public wellbeing, environmental health (cost of clean up), scientific integrity, or regional and national economic vitality.

• Fallacy of GDP: Christchurch earthquake was good for GDP but not the people.

• Growth, production and intensification lifts GDP

but no relationship to “profit and resilience” at farm level

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Environmental effects and costs

ProductionProductivityProfit

Inputs

SWEETZONE

Limitless growth – The way central and local government see it

Magnitude

PRODUCTION = getting more OUTPUT

PRODUCTIVITY = more OUTPUT from SAME or FEWER

inputs.

PROFIT = making money after costs accounted for &

paying tax

NZ confuses P and P and P

SWEETZONE

Profit (ROC)

Environmental Effects and costs

Production

Productivity

Inputs

Biological systems have natural limits

Magnitude

Farmers pushed to right by processors

- THEO SPEIRINGS 30th of OCTOBER 2014: “..believes NZ dairying can continue to expand over the next decade ,with 60 % of expansion based on conversions and more animals and 40% on more productivity .He said the country had NOT reached the point of having too many cows. He disagrees with Environment Commissioner‘s comments that more dairying means a drop in water quality . NZ dairying could easily grow for the next 10 years by 2-3% per year ”.

REALITY CHECK: However, this will require approximately 22 MILLION TONNES (10X current PKE imports) of extra dry matter fed which will create extra pathogen and nutrient problems

This expansion will not create extra profits for our dairy farmers as overall cost exceeds the

value of product.

GOVT GROWTH AGENDA TO DOUBLE OUTPUT + VALUE BY 2025

• STUDHOLME: Maybe 400,000 more cows + more irrigation in SOUTH CANTERBURY to supply expansion.

• Raw sewage load to land of 7-8 million people

• 5714 T N to receiving water bodies• Last place in Canterbury with good

water quality• Means more – Dairy and dairy

support land (monoculture)• Irrigation – Spillover - Effects

INDUSTRIAL EXPANSION = INDUSTRIAL EFFECTS = INDUSTRIAL LEGACIES

BELIEF vs REALITYDouble Agriculture Contribution to GDP by 2025 through OUTPUT and VALUE

Increasing output on marginal land with marginal costs is NOT PROFITABLE

$400 Million into Irrigation Schemes to Promote more Irrigated Pasture/Dairy

MARGINAL COSTS > RETURNSRuataniwha: Needed $8.00 kg MS.

Value Add PRICE CHANGES ARE CYCLICAL DAIRY PRIVE CHANGE IS STRUCTURAL

Ecosystem will continue to absorb the legacy: Water Limit for NITROGEN to TOXICITY level in Rivers

Ashburton Water UNSAFE to DRINK

Govt increased E Coli Level to allow 400% more faecal material leaving us with WADEABLE RIVERS

Already have some of highest rates of zoonoses in world – Ashburton Hinds region.

NZ Is the lowest cost producer in the world and has a responsibility to feed the world

NZ is no longer low cost + has highest debt for dairy land in world.

hard to reduce overall gross emissions due to methane – therefore EXEMPT AG from ETS

We could constrain Nitrous Cycle and Reduce overall emissions on farm by around 20-30% without affecting profit. We can do this without methane inhibitors.

Hawkes Bay

Tukituki River + Ruataniwha Dam Proposal - 25000 ha irrigated + 14000 ha intensified. Proposed 37% Dairy, 32% mixed arable+ dairy support, 9% orchard/vineyard. Land once converted= $46000/Ha . irrigation costs $1000 per ha per year. Cost of milk production Milksolids. + Debt servicing = need $8-9.00 kg MS long term to be viable.No longer LOW COST DOWN UNDER

Dairy NZ, Fonterra, HBRC, HBIC, Fed Farmers, all SUPPORTED NITROGEN TOXICITY in Tukituki River - single nutrient (P)management for rivers (NIWA model)

Proposed Ruataniwha Dam: Hawkes Bay

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COURTS and EPA SHAPE THE NZ GROWTH AGENDA (2013)

NZ has failed to account for externalities from agricultural growth

Per 25,000 ha of Pine To PastureDiffuse Losses to receiving environments

Greenhouse Gas (C02)

8,100 Tonne

Nitrate from root zone

1,200 Tonne

Phorphorus 150 Tonne

Pathogens Population of Christchurch in Broadlands

Sediment -

Upper Waikato Conversions

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> 60,000 Ha in last decade and continuing

Rotorua Lakes example:

PUBLIC IS PAYING

$500 M “End of Pipe” Clean Up Costs

Cost of nitrogen removal from receiving water i.e: floating wetlands in Rotoruarange between $246,000 T N

And up to $400,000/tonne ($400/kg) paid to farmers to reduce it ex root zone from Overseer model (V 5.4): i.e: $70 Mill Lake Taupo Catchment + $40 Mill in Rotorua

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Diffuse losses from Agriculture

nitrogen, phosphorus, sediment and bugs (diffuse losses to water)

Nitrous oxide, methane, carbon dioxide (diffuse gas loss to atmosphere)

Nitrate - through the Land

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FACT: Upper SelwynContinued unprofitable

marginal land intensification in enriched areas compounds the

issue. E.g: Groundwater nitrate levels increasing and for example in

Selwyn + predictions are for ↑ 29% due to CPW irrigation

scheme coming on line.29

30% of shallow wells show↑ N and pathogen trends within a decade of development

70% of dairying is on shallow soils in Canterbury –unvalidated for N loss.

Managed Aquifer Recharge is the plan to DILUTE THE POLLTION in Hinds following further irrigation schemes.

Alpine water mixed with lower catchment nutrient enriched water.

Still unproven as remedy for large scale underground polluted water bodies..

Public will pay.

Plans to double irrigation in the region. 600000 Ha to 1200000 Ha30

70% of of region is at risk or over-allocated nutrients and water- now CLAWBACK is requiredCANTERBURY

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42% of sites in Canterbury in Feb 2016 show presence of faecal material.

They are classed as “risky to non swimmable” at present.

Ministry of health risk level

Pathogens

What a failed environment looks like

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How do pathogens make their way

to receiving water bodies?

• A complex interconnected pathway within

the landscape that ultimately can link

animal (zoonotic) pathogens to man.

• Agricultural activities, including irrigation

and intensification on vulnerable soils,

drains, wetlands, rivers, lakes and

eventually coastal food collection

environments create a fully linked system

where the paddock pathogens can find a

pathway the swimming hole, plate,

or the mahinga kai collection zones.

What We Don’t Measure and What is Risky• Rural communities and farming homes

often do not have adequate water treatment or filtration systems.

• Drinking water supplies increasingly are put under greater pressure as pathogen loading of the environment occurs.

• Protozoa are not picked up by this conventional test.

• Cyptosporidia and Giardia are common examples noted to be of very high incidence in rural communities in areas such as Ashburton and Hinds..

• Other pathogen examples of public health concern that can spill over to the environment from bovine species that CANNOT be reliably detected using the E Coli proxy are Yersinia, Mycobacterium avian paratuberculosis (MAP) and leptospirosis.

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SOLUTIONS

Most of my patients were animals

• Catchment Vet

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Now I can only think catchments + connectivity,

PEOPLELAND

ANIMALS

ONE WORLDONE HEALTH

ONE LIFE

win- win for rivers and profit

CONSTRAIN THE N CYCLE RISK OF DIFFUSE LOSS

N P Sediment Pathogens GHG

Optimise Stock Nos – maximise productive efficiency.

↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

manage protein (N) in diet for optimum nutrition.

↓ ↓

Strategic fertilising only as required according to whole farm testing.

↓ ↓ ↓

No cropping on high risk soils, slopes ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

Minimise use of water on high demand crops (e.g: pasture) on leaky soils

↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

PRODUCTION VS POLLUTION MEASURESKg Milksolids per kg N lost……

-

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

J V B K C P U I G D W Q M T A R N L F O H X S E

KgM

S/h

a P

er

KgN

Le

ach

ed

/ha

Tomrrows farms Today Group

TFT Group 2013 - Production N Loss Efficiency

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McKnight + Robinsons

FOODS need to relate resource (water use, pollution absorption) efficiencies and health impacts……

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Food water use and your virtual water footprint

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SOLUTIONS?• Stop the Denial.• Stop intensifying vulnerable land classes.• Just excluding stock from streams wont fix this – we will have to do more.

• Honest/Legitimate Environmental Reporting• Reward the most efficient resource users: product/pollution or

product/water impact• Farm environment plans wont fix this – Need System Plans to deal with

systemic problem.

• Business leaders will Head this change from the Bottom Up – ie like Landcorp (largest sole NZ farmer forms an ERG and listens)

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47THANKYOU

THINK CATCHMENTS – WORK TOGETHER – ONE WORLD – ONE HEALTH

ANZECC trigger level

Nitrate

What a failed environment looks like