Update November 2022 – A Win and a Loss!
14 December 2022On November 4, the Environment Court acknowledged the biosecurity risks of the transfer to Mercury Bay of invasive, uncontrollable pests present in mussel farms in the Coromandel. The Win.
These pests are not in Mercury Bay. We now have hope to keep it that way!
We want to thank all our supporters over the last 4 years who have got us to this point.
However, the Court also ruled that the mussel spat farm can proceed if new ropes for the spat catch are used each time. (The Loss). The applicant or sponsor of the project had wanted to bring used ropes back and forth from sites in the Coromandel. This means that the sponsors could go ahead with a permanent infrastructure in place for the farm and use new ropes. That is a lot of plastic shedding ropes - around 700 km!
What next?
An appeal to the High Court? We disagree with the Environment Court’s earlier findings and have lodged an appeal: there are risks to mammals, seabirds from plastic waste, recreational users of Mercury Bay; there will be debris and light pollution from flashing lights. The adjacent coastline is an area of outstanding natural beauty! We are considering this appeal, but further funding is a concern.
Community/Tourist opposition and pressure on our appointed representatives?
There is so much wrong with having this farm in Mercury Bay.
DOC is consulting on doubling the size of Whanganui-a-Hei (Cathedral Cove) marine reserve on the other side of Mercury Bay. So, only in part of Mercury Bay the sponsors of the expansion care about the environment?
Did you know that mussel farms are banned in Mercury Bay? But a spat mussel farm that catches baby mussels swimming in the sea and growing them until they can be transferred elsewhere to grow to full size, is not classed as a mussel farm. It makes no sense. It looks like and is a type of mussel farm.
Is this farm needed? There are alternative options: 1) The experts say, “344 billion spat are harvested each year, but <1% of these are retained on farms from seeding through to final harvest. Improving efficiency by even a small percentage would produce substantial gains for industry.” Prof. A Jeffs et al. 2) Grow spat in onshore facilities and 3) offshore spat farms.
We will keep you informed about the WRC final consent and any further actions we might take.
We thank you once again for your support.
The Save the Mercury Bay Trust savemercurybay.trust@gmail.com