Economic drivers of land use and groundwater use by irrigators, Waimea Plains Nelson, New Zealand

Figures & data

Figure 1  The Waimea Plains, Nelson, with location of three aquifers including the Lower Confined Aquifer (after Thomas 2001) and location of properties taking groundwater from the Lower Confined Aquifer for agricultural irrigation that contributed to the survey.

Table 1  Summary of groundwater allocation for irrigation, property numbers and land area (to the nearest hectare), Lower Confined Aquifer (LCA), 2003–4 to 2007–8 irrigation seasons.

Item	2003–4	2004–5	2005–6	2006–7	2007–8
Properties in survey (number)	17	17	15	17	17
Total LCA properties with allocation (number)	21	21	21	22^a	22^a
Properties in survey/total LCA properties (%)	81	81	71	77	77
Irrigated land area of properties in survey (ha)	209	201	177	164	200
Area of properties in survey total (ha)	236	236	230	232	232
Irrigated land area/land area total, survey (%)	89	85	77	71	86
Groundwater allocation in survey (m^3/week)	70,255	70,255	68,285	68,985	68,985
Total groundwater allocation for irrigation, LCA (m^3/week)	70,725	70,725	70,725	70,725	70,725
Groundwater allocation survey/total allocation for irrigation (%)	99	99	97	98	98
^aSale of part of one property before the start of the 2006–7 irrigation season.

Table 2  Land area for nine classes of land use.

Land use	2003–4 (ha)	2004–5 (ha)	2005–6 (ha)	2006–7 (ha)	2007–8 (ha)
Dairy	91.7	91.7	87.7	23	19.5
Apples	66.19	61.76	41.34	42.53	54.03
Horticulture-other	14.08	21.7	21.3	36.6	57.95
Market garden	18	10.73	11.8	47.46	51.26
Fruit-other	5.45	5.45	7.95	5.95	5.75
Cropping	2.6	2.6	0	0	0
Pasture irrigated	10.9	6.9	6.9	8.9	11.93
Pasture-dryland	8	16	35.03	47.73	13.77
Unproductive	18.86	18.94	17.5	19.61	17.59
Total land area	235.78	235.78	229.52	231.78	231.78
Properties, four main economic activities (number)	15	15	13	15	16
Total area of irrigated land, four main economic activities, rounded (ha)	190	186	162	146	179

Table 3  Revenue for four main economic activities and other land uses.

Main economic activity	Irrigated land use	2003–4 ($000/year)	2004–5 ($000/year)	2005–6 ($000/year)	2006–7 ($000/year)	2007–8 ($000/year)
Dairy	Dairy	746	610	626	230	368
	H, M^a	0	0	0	0	0
	Other	0	0	0	12	0
Sub-total dairy		746	610	626	242	368
Apples	Apples	2076	1700	1576	1706	1081
	H, M^a	75	84	175	166	71
	Other	0	0	4	9	0
Sub-total apples		2151	1230	1755	1881	1152
Horticulture-other	Horticulture-other	296	321	798	2312	4624
	A, M^a	0	0	0	0	0
	Other	0	0	0	0	0
Sub-total horticulture-other		296	321	798	2312	4624
Market garden	Market garden	434	184	282	775	1127
	A, H^a	0	0	0	0	0
	Other	0	0	0	0	0
Sub-total market garden		434	184	282	775	1127
Other		5	7	5	16	7
Total		3632	2906	3466	5226	7278
^aMain economic activity, where this is different from the main economic activity of the property: dairy (D), apples (A), horticulture-other (H) or market gardening (M).

Table 4  Production revenue and irrigated area for selected properties.

Main economic activity	Item	2003–4	2004–5	2005–6	2006–7	2007–8	Average revenue per hectare per year 2004–5 to 2007–8^b ($/ha/year)	Profit per hectare per year 2004–5 to 2007–8^b,c ($/ha/year)
Dairy	Revenue ($000/year)	746	610	626	230	368
	Revenue per hectare ($/ha/year)	8135	6652	7138	10,000	18,872	8,265	3,995
	Irrigated land area (ha)	91.7	91.7	87.7	23	19.5
Apples	Revenue ($000/year)	1504	1062	947	1035	978
	Revenue per hectare ($/ha/year)	32,653	23,057	45,882	47,630	29,431	33,059	5,894
	Irrigated land area (ha)	46.06	46.06	20.64	21.73	33.23
Horticulture-other	Revenue ($000/year)	na^a	62	462	2036	4189
	Revenue per hectare ($/ha/year)	na^a	3647	27,176	63,625	79,038	56,714	20,049
	Irrigated land area (ha)	na^a	17	17	32	53
Market garden	Revenue ($000/year)	434	184	282	775	1127
	Revenue per hectare ($/ha/year)	62,000	48,421	74,211	18,693	27,183	26,160	8,426
	Irrigated land area (ha)	7	3.8	3.8	41.46	41.46
Total	Total revenue ($000/year)	2684^a	1918	2317	4076	6662
	Average total annual revenue per hectare in survey^a ($/ha/year)	18,541^a	12,096	17,942	34,487	45,261	27,072	7,455
	Total irrigated land area (ha)	144.76^a	158.56	129.14	118.19	147.19
^a No properties with horticulture-other are selected in 2003–4 because horticulture-other was less than 75% of irrigated property land area. ^bA 4-year period is used as statistics for horticulture-other in 2003–4 are not available; average is the sum of revenue divided by the sum of irrigated land area. ^cProfit (gross) as earnings minus costs, exclusive of interest and tax.

Table 5  Mechanism of land use change and revenue change, 2003–4 to 2007–8.

		Annual land use change (ha)
Mechanism of land use change	Revenue change	2003–4 to 2004–5	2004–5 to 2005–6	2005–6 to 2006–7	2006–7 to 2007–8	Total (ha)
Land lease	Revenue increase	16	7	33	1	57
	Revenue decrease	6	4	0	1	11
Land sale	Revenue increase	0	0	20	0	20
	Revenue decrease	0	0	0	0	0
Owners own	Revenue increase	3	0	1	12	16
	Revenue decrease	0	24	2	0	26
All land use change	Revenue increase	19	7	54	13	93
	Revenue decrease	6	28	2	1	37
					Total	130
Land areas are rounded to the nearest hectare

Table 6  Dairy and apple production and efficiency measures, selected properties 2003–4 to 2007–8.

Item	2003–4	2004–5	2005–6	2006–7	2007–8
Dairy production (kg milk solids)	155490	134500	128418	40000	45600
Dairy production (kg/ha/year)	1696	1467	1464	2051	2851
Dairy production and groundwater use (kg/m^3)	0.9	0.6	0.3	0.9	0.7
Dairy average price ($/kg)	4.33	4.19	4.45	4.35	7.84
Apple production (TCE^a/year)	85,405	84,979	57,196	58,763	51,476
Apple production (TCE/ha/year)	1854	1845	2771	2704	1549
Apple production and groundwater use (TCE/m^3)	0.51	0.61	0.79	0.75	0.38
Average apple price ($/TCE)	17.61	12.50	16.56	17.61	19.00
^aApple production is measured as ‘tray carton equivalent’ (TCE).

Table 7  Groundwater use for selected properties with rainfall and rainfall minus Penman Potential Evapotranspiration (PET) at Nelson Airport during irrigation seasons.

Main economic activity	Item	2003–4	2004–5	2005–6	2006–7	2007–8	Average groundwater use 2004–5 to 2007–8^b (m^3/ha/year)
Dairy	Groundwater use (m^3/year)	270,614	224,019	198,913	44,784	57,761
	Groundwater use (m^3/ha/year)	2951	2443	2268	1947	2962	2368
Apples	Groundwater use (m^3/year)	167,098	138,327	72,775	78,049	134,366
	Groundwater use (m^3/ha/year)	3628	3003	3526	3592	4044	3481
Horticulture-other	Groundwater use (m^3/year)	na^a	21,824	36,096	69,569	136,596
	Groundwater use (m^3/ha/year)	na^a	1284	2123	2174	2577	2219
Market garden	Groundwater use (m^3/year)	6629	6249	2440	84,302	69,033
	Groundwater use (m^3/ha/year)	947	1644	642	2033	1665	1790
Total	Total groundwater use (m^3/year)	444,341	390,419	310,224	276,704	397,756
	Average total groundwater use (m^3/ha/year)	3070	2462	2402	2341	2702	2486
Rainfall (mm/season)		447	444	387	273	382
Rainfall minus PET (mm/season)		−309	−289	−396	−445	−375
Statistics on irrigated land area are listed in Table 4. ^a No properties with horticulture-other are selected because horticulture-other was less than 75% of irrigated property land area. ^bA 4-year period is used as no horticulture-other properties are selected in 2003–4; average is the sum of groundwater use divided by the sum of land area (Table 4).

Table 8  Groundwater use efficiency as revenue per cubic metre of groundwater applied on selected properties.

Main economic activity	2003–4 ($/m^3)	2004–5 ($/m^3)	2005–6 ($/m^3)	2006–7 ($/m^3)	2007–8 ($/m^3)	Average 2004–5 to 2007–8^b ($/m^3)
Dairy	2.8	2.7	3.1	5.1	6.4	3.5
Apples	9.0	7.7	13.0	13.3	7.3	9.5
Horticulture-other	na^a	2.8	12.8	29.3	30.7	25.6
Market garden	65.5	29.4	115.6	9.2	16.3	14.6
Average of four main economic activities	na^a	4.9	7.5	14.7	16.7	10.9
^aNo properties with horticulture-other are selected because horticulture-other was less than 75% of irrigated property land area. ^bA 4-year period is used as statistics for horticulture-other in 2003–4 are not available; average is the average revenue in $/ha/year (Table 4) divided by average groundwater use in m^3/ha/year (Table 7), rounded.

Thomas , JA . 2001 . “ Tasman ” . In Groundwaters of New Zealand , Edited by: Rosen , MR and White , PA . 411 – 425 . Wellington : New Zealand Hydrological Society Inc .

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