EAPSI: Examining the Effectiveness of New Zealand's Water Quality Policy in Enabling Farm-Scale Behavior Change

Hammond Wagner Courtney R, Burlington VT

Investigators

Abstract

Runoff of nitrogen and phosphorus from agricultural lands is impacting water quality in rivers and lakes across the globe. Social and political factors have proven to be barriers to effective management of these nutrients. The Lake Taupo and Lake Rotorua watersheds in New Zealand are implementing innovative water quality policies which regulate nutrient use at the farm scale. The success of this policy is dependent on the extent to which these policies change farmer behavior. To understand how these water quality policies are affecting behavior, the researcher will conduct a policy analysis and in-depth interviews with farmers in each region. This research will be conducted in collaboration with Dr. Suzie Greenhalgh, a noted expert on water quality policy, at Landcare Research in Auckland, New Zealand. This project will contribute to a greater understanding of which attributes of water quality policy promote social, ecological and economic well-being with the goal of improving policy design. This policy analysis will examine the effectiveness of New Zealand's governance approach to managing agricultural nonpoint source pollution. Importantly, Lake Taupo and Lake Rotorua?s water quality regimes are rare examples of water quality policies that require farmers to achieve a mandated nutrient leaching rate from their farms. Methodologically, the research will employ key informant and stakeholder interviews, and will focus on the farmer as the unit of analysis. The analysis will use Elinor Ostro's Social Ecological Systems Framework and Design Principles to examine how the policies in place enable, influence or enforce behavior change. This research will improve understanding of the efficacy of alternative approaches to water quality policy design and implementation. This is of importance to the numerous regions globally approaching ecological limits in water quality and searching for means to regulate resource use. This award under the East Asia and Pacific Summer Institutes program supports summer research by a U.S. graduate student and is jointly funded by NSF and the Royal Society of New Zealand.