“Highly careless” dairy effluent discharge results in large fine

A Waikato farmer, Wayne Maurice Clarke, has been convicted and fined $97,500 for unlawfully discharging dairy effluent into the environment on his farm at Te Kōwhai, near Hamilton.

The fine was imposed by Judge Melinda Dickey in a decision released by Huntly District Court on 15 October 2026, following a prosecution brought by Waikato Regional Council under the Resource Management Act.

In September 2025, council officers inspected the defendant’s 170-cow dairy farm and found significant ponding of dairy effluent as a result of it being irrigated onto already saturated soils.

Officers found the effluent infrastructure on the farm was inadequate, lacking proper storage and management oversight of irrigation practices.

“These unlawful discharges were entirely avoidable. Despite decades of ownership and management by Mr Clarke, insufficient investment had been made in effluent infrastructure and systems to ensure effluent was managed sustainably. It was concerning that no one had oversight of effluent irrigation over a three-day period leading up to this incident, despite wet weather and soil conditions,” said the council’s Investigations Team Leader Evan Billington in response to the sentencing.

“Between 2015 and 2024, the council issued Mr Clarke with an abatement notice, six infringement notices and five formal warnings for environmental breaches. Despite these actions, he has failed to improve his system or practices,” Mr Billington said.

In sentencing the defendant, Judge Dickey said: “I assess Mr Clarke’s conduct as being highly careless. I do so in the context of his sustained failure to prevent effluent discharges at the farm, despite significant council intervention and repeated advice that the farm’s effluent system was inadequate and required upgrading. The offending was entirely foreseeable and could have been avoided if Mr Clarke had complied with his environmental obligations in a timely manner.”

Sentencing decision [PDF, 413 KB]

Council officer sampling ponded dairy effluent.