Irrigation to boost Waiau about $4.5 M

Press, 26 November 1980, Page 2

Irrigation to boost Waiau about $4.5 M

Opening the Waiau plains Irrigation scheme in North Canterbury yesterday, the Minister of Works and Deveolpment (Mr W. L Young) said it would increase the district’s gross farm ea.nings about $4.5 million a year.

The inc.ease in stock carried would be about 150.000 sheep, and there would be opportunities for nore families to live and work in the area, generating additional business. Nationally, the scheme would boost overseas warnings, Mr Young said. Year by year the Government had substantially ncreased the soil and vater vote to a record $3B million, a figure Mr t’oung suggested might be aised in the mini-Budget.

The Associate Minister ' :f Finance (Mr Quigley) toted that the estimated cost of the scheme had risen from $11.3M when it was approved in 1977 to 521.8 M this year. This was part of the inflationary process that all suffered from.

The cost of New Zealand imports had risen 46 per cent in the year to June, and this flowed through to internal costs. Petroleum imports now cost all exports from meat, compared with 20 per cent in 1972. However, Mr Quigley said, prices received by farmers, and their profit margins, had kept pace with inflation.

Noting the opportunities for diversification, offered by water schemes such as Waiau’s, Mr Quigley said farming had become too specialised and perhaps

too capital-intensive and did not employ enough people. Such a scheme would attract more people from the cities. The new chairman of the Amur! County and also chairman of the farmers' irrigation committee in the district, Mr A. W. B. McMillan, said that on such schemes funds should be made available continuously during construction and not stop-go as had happened in the last year. He sought an assurance from Mr Young that this would not happen again. He also urged that water charges should not be pitched so high that the scheme would not be used. The District Commissioner of Works (Mr P. F. Reynold) who presided, said that next to Waiau was the proposed Balmoral scheme. He said it was a mistake that they had not been combined. The Balmoral scheme now needed “a push in the right direction from certain quarters.” Mr Young replied that farmers had supported the scheme and it was now going through the various processes.

Before a large gathering, Mr Young unveiled a plaque on the control house near the scheme’s intake on the Waiau River and pushed buttons to activate two gates, allowing water to flow into the main race.

Water will be available on two blocks of the scheme totalling about 8500 ha, of which farmers have prepared about 1400 ha for irrigation.