Land and Water (Protection and Use) Forum: An illustrative case of experimentation and learning in policy implementation

Looking at collaborative processes after they have occurred is always easier than it was at the time they were first happening. They tend to look more designed, orderly, and less messy than they actually were. In Land and Water Forum case, a number of strands of activity/inactivity came together. Guy Salmon, a well known and widely respected environmental advocate had been funded to examine more collaborative approaches to environmental policy used in the Nordic countries, and he reported on his findings to an audience with a wide range of the key players in the water conservation and use area opening up the vista of a different approach. According to Salmon, the Nordic countries had some impressive achievements in making major changes to create more sustainability in infrastructure and resource use. In New Zealand, progress beyond earlier policy initiatives (1967 Water and Soil Conservation Act to the RMA in 1991) to establish a framework for land and water protection and use had stalled, and processes round water had become increasingly conflict-riven and uncertain. Ministers in the then new national-led government saw this increasing difficulty in establishing a consensus about what constitutes sustainable land use and its implications for freshwater as an opportunity to back a different approach.