Marron saga ends

Forest and Bird, Issue 265, 1 August 1992, Page 3

Marron saga ends

Alan Tennyson

ENVIRONMENTALISTS breathed a sigh of relief on hearing final notice that the farming of marron crayfish in New Zealand would not be approved. The government decided in April that the potential risk that marron posed to New Zealand’s native freshwater fauna was too great. The decision signals the end to an unnecessary and costly saga. Marron were first imported from their native Western Australia in 1987. An environmental impact assessment was carried out but it was heavily criticised as inadequate by Forest and Bird, the Federation of Freshwater Anglers and the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.

Nevertheless, the Labour Government approved the licensing of a marron farm at Warkworth. Then in 1990 with the election of a new government, Fisheries Minister Doug Kidd acted on the growing environmental concerns. The government began negotiations to buy the farm, and a committee was set up to evaluate properly the risks marron posed to freshwater ecosystems. The committee reported on the research requirements for an environmental impact study on marron, concluding that there was potential for serious damage but that there was a dearth of information on the full effects. Because of these concerns the committee recommended a major research

programme. The research proposal raised many questions about the suitability of farming marron in | this country and the govern- | ment, it seems, decided against farming after realising that a long and costly research programme was likely to result in a recommendation against it. The end to marron farming and the similar 1990 decision against channel catfish are a credit to the vigilance of environmental groups and freshwater anglers. These are historic decisions that will hopefully be a turning point in the battle to stop more potential. pests being imported. New Zealand has enough of these to worry about without adding to the list.