The Gelita factory in Woolston, Christchurch. The factory was extensively damaged in a fire in January.

﻿Christchurch gelatine company Gelita has been fined $53,000 after animal waste* was dumped on three sites in Southland, including a paddock behind a primary school.

The company was fined along with McDowall Rural Services, that company's directors – Gordon Fleming McDowall and Kent Campbell McDowall – and Southland farm owner Cameron Gregory Kerr.

Gelita made a deal in 2016 to dispose of a waste material known as skutch, which is a residue from the production of gelatine from cow faces and ears. Before the deal, skutch was disposed of through a Christchurch composting operation or at Kate Valley landfill, with special authority.

JOHN KIRK-ANDERSON/STUFF Gelita factory manager Gary Monk in the Christchurch factory in 2014.

The McDowalls deposited skutch on Five Rivers farm in Southland, but they later discovered a consent was required and moved the waste material to a yard in the small town of Browns in Southland.

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About 80 tonnes of skutch was deposited on Five Rivers farm, while 390 tonnes was deposited at the yard in two piles. One pile was about 30 metres wide and 3m tall. Skutch was also spread over a paddock behind the primary school in Browns.

The school and other local residents complained about the smell, so the Southland Regional Council officers visited the yard. They found the smell to be objectionable and offensive, and also observed a black, strong smelling discharge running from the piles and ponding within metres of a nearby creek.

District Court Judge Brian Dwyer wrote in his sentencing report that skutch had higher levels of contaminants than dairy effluent.

Dwyer was critical of how Gelita disposed of the animal waste.

"Industrial users who have to manage contaminants or contaminated by-products have an obligation to ensure that they are appropriately disposed of," he wrote.

"They cannot wipe their hands of the product as it goes out the factory gate in possession of a third party to whom they have consigned it.

"Gelita allowed delivery of the skutch to go on over a period of some months when some 587 tonnes or so were put onto properties."

Five Rivers farm owner Cameron Gregory Kerr was fined $21,375.

McDowall Rural Services was not fined as the judge found it was unable to pay a fine because it was "technically insolvent". Dwyer fined Gordon Fleming McDowall and Kent Campbell McDowall $28,300 each to be paid over five years.

"It is apparent that because you did not make proper investigations or ask the right questions before this all started, you got into a situation where you had a tiger by the tail," the judge wrote of the McDowalls.

* An earlier version of this story described skutch as meat waste. In fact, skutch comes from processing cow hides, not meat.