By KATH GANNAWAY
YARRA Ranges Councillor Jim Child has urged anyone concerned about proposed changes around intensive animal husbandry to do their own research into what the council is proposing with Amendment C146.
As reported in the Mail last week, the proposed amendment would remove the current prohibition on intensive animal husbandry in Green Wedge Zones 1, 2 and 3, and introduce a permit process to deal with ‘free range’ farming in those zones.
Countering concerns raised in a Change.Org petition which depicted pigs raised in a ‘battery’ environment, Cr Child said it misrepresented what council was proposing.
In a letter to the Mail (see page 6), he said the Mail article also missed the true intent.
“That (intent) is to introduce a permit process to consider present and future ‘free range’ farming in Green Wedge Zones 1, 2 and 3 in line with all other municipalities with Green Wedge Zones,” he said.
However, Greens spokesperson on local government and planning and Yarra Ranges resident Samantha Dunn, MP, said the intent wasn’t the problem.
Kallista resident, Paul Grujic, also questioned the process.
“I don’t have a problem with what they are trying to achieve, but with how they are trying to achieve it,” Mr Grujic told the Mail.
Both Mr Brujic and Ms Dunn, who was a former Yarra Ranges councillor, are calling for the State legislation that defines Intensive Animal Husbandry to be changed.
Mr Brujic said he had real concerns about people being able to take advantage of the changed permit process to introduce the types of farming practices that were not what the council intended.
“What should happen, legally, is you get a permit, but you only have to wander around the hills to see examples of things that don’t have permits.
“Someone will set up this sort of thing, and it will be too late when we have to start picking up the pieces.
“If these changes are made, people will find ways around them.”
Ms Dunn said she accepted free-range farming in Yarra Ranges.
“I accept that it is a reasonable use of green wedge land, but that use could be accommodated in the short term in other ways, and the best way is a site specific amendment,” she said.
“The council should go to the state to make the distinction between free range farming and intensive animal husbandry.
“At the moment, limitations are within the planning scheme and its definitions. Until that is addressed at state level, I don’t think the guarantees can be there for the community.”
Cr Child said however, the interpretation was clear.
“Free range is free range”, he said.
“There is no way in the world that the council supports the sort of farming depicted in that photo and the reaction they got is what they wanted.”
Cr Child said he was getting a lot of positive commentary supporting the proposal that all green wedge zones should be the same, with the appropriate conditions in place.
He said the Regional Strategy Plan was now 30 years old, and it was time to reflect that farming is done differently now to meet a growing demand for free range products.
Addressing concerns that the new permit process may not be watertight, he said people should look at the consultants’ report and what is proposed.
“I am absolutely sure that the conditions that will be put in place will ensure that the type of factory farming depicted in the Change.Org photo will not happen,” he said.
