Parliamentary Secretary for the Central Coast, Mr Scot MacDonald, had a follow-up meeting with farmers on the Central Coast to discuss the proposed Primary Production and Rural Development State Environmental Planning Policy (SEPP).
The meeting took place at Somersby on Monday, December 18.
Mr MacDonald said a number of farmers from the Central Coast attended a forum earlier in December, in Cessnock, on the review of NSW Planning Guidelines for rural areas.
The meeting was to review the changes, and specifically the removal of Clause 11 of Sydney Regional Environmental Plan 8, Central Coast Plateau Areas.
The Central Coast will fall under the new Primary Production SEPP.
Rather than planning guidelines in clause 11 of SREP8, land use in the Central Coast will be guided by the Council’s LEP, the Central Coast Regional Plan and Ministerial Directions (section 117).
The proposed Primary Production SEPP considers: right to farm issues; housing in rural areas; subdivisions and farming fragmentation; aquaculture; intensive livestock operations; and, identification of important state significant agricultural lands.
“Farming remains an important part of the culture and economy of the Central Coast,” Mr Macdonald said.
“The Regional Plan identifies land west of the M1 as continuing to have an ongoing role in primary production,” he said.
“I want to see agriculture on the Coast considered and appropriately protected in local and state planning.”
Submissions to the proposed Primary Production and Rural Development SEPP close on January 15.
Source:
Media release, Dec 13
Kit Hale, office of Scot Macdonald