‘Don’t Muddy the Water’
NZ: Project for best soil practice on farms
The project titled ‘Don’t Muddy the Water’ has received $490,000 in funding support from the latest round of the Sustainable Farming Fund.
Other contributors included the Vegetable Research and Innovation Board, the Foundation for Arable Research and four regional councils.
Horticulture New Zealand’s Natural Resources and Environment team manager Chris Keenan sees the collaboration of these groups as essential to the development of information that benefits vegetable growers.
“It is exciting to have a project where we can work proactively with regional councils on an area which is so important for this industry,” Chris says.
The research will quantify the effectiveness of sediment control on cultivated land.
“It will be focused on keeping soil in the paddock and out of the waterways, which is a win for the environment and for farmers.”
The project will run trials of different good management practices to test which ones give the best results for reducing sediment and phosphorous entering waterways.
“The results of this study will provide evidence that good management practices are effective across all regions, confirming our advice and research of the last 15 years.”
For more information:
Chris Keenan
Horticulture New Zealand
Tel: +64 027 6680142
www.hortnz.co.nz