Wairau/ Awatere Resource Management Plan 25 August 2011 allocated since 1992 and 20% of new marine farming space. This is partly met through the allocation to iwi of some of the new space that comes available through the creation of AMAs. This is intended to ensure iwi have access to coastal marine space to develop their marine farming interests, and to allow the marine farming industry to develop without risks from ongoing Treaty claims. Existing lawfully established marine farms are deemed to be AMAs, which means they do not need to be included in the Plan through a Plan Change. Marine farming permits and licences granted under previous Marine Farming and Fisheries legislation are generally deemed to be coastal permits. When resource consents for a marine farm are about to expire, if the site is in an AMA, the existing marine farmer can make an application for a new marine farming consent for the same water space. The application from the existing marine farmer will be decided first, before any other application can be considered for that space. Creating new AMAs requires a Plan Change. There are three different processes available to undertaken this: a Council-initiated Plan Change, where Council decides to undertake a plan change to establish an AMA in the coastal marine area; a standard Private Plan Change, where any person or organisation can request a change to the Plan to establish an AMA in the coastal marine area; and a Council Invited Private Plan Change (IPPC), which involves the Council inviting applications from the public to establish new AMAs. The Council may identify areas of the coastal marine area which will be excluded from applications. These Plan Changes are processed in a similar manner to Private Plan Changes. All these processes follow the consultation and public notification processes set out in the Act. Removal or modification of existing AMAs in the Plan, including deemed AMAs, also involves a Plan Change process. Once an AMA is created, 20-40% of authorisations (or the right to apply for a resource consent for marine farming) are allocated by the Council to a trustee to resolve historic Treaty claims, and the remaining authorisations become publicly available. Where AMAs have been created through a Council-initiated Plan Change, the remaining authorisations are allocated by public tender. Where an AMA has been created through the IPPC process the remaining authorisations are allocated to the person or organisation that requested the Plan Change. Where an AMA has been created through the Standard Plan Change process the Act specifies that the authorisations are allocated by public tender unless an alternative method of allocation is used. Once the authorisations have been allocated, the holders of the authorisations then need to apply for resource consents for marine farming. 9 - 3A