by Metiria Turei
Following from Jeanette’s interview on RNZ tonight, I had a (rather fun) radio interview with Larry Williams on Gerry Brownlee’s speech to the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy 2009 today.
It seems that what Gerry said to the Institute is already being manipultated by his spin doctors, doing their best to disguise the full government intent. Larry, buying that spin, argued that Gerry had said he wouldn’t dig up areas of high conservation value. What Gerry really said was:
“I understand that DOC administered land hosts a majority of our mineral potential – an estimated 70%. About 40% of that land is listed in Schedule 4 of the Crown Minerals Act. That means something like 30% of our most prospective land is off limits because the Minister of Conservation is not allowed to enter into any access arrangement for any area described in Schedule 4, except for certain low impact activities…I have directed Crown Minerals to undertake a strategic review to determine areas possessing significant mineral potential that, with the removal of the access prohibition provided by Schedule 4, could through responsible mining techniques contribute considerably to our prosperity. “
No Right Turn has the Schedule 4 list which includes National Parks, Wildlife Sanctuaries, Wetalnds of International Importance and Marine Reserves. These are areas that were included in the schedule precisely because they were already determined to be areas of outstanding biodiversity and landscape significance.
Larry also argued today that the Minister was simply wanting a review and wasn’t that reasonable given the Minister didn’t know where the apparently billions of dollars of mineral wealth was? Well, that makes for a grossly uninformed Minister. There is lignite underneath the Awarua Wetland and its surrounding areas. The communities of that Wetland and the productive farmland around it has lived with the threat of lignite mining for many years now. The Awarua Wetland/Waituna Lagoon is 19,000 hectares of RAMSAR wetland and of major international significance.
And finally the argument was raised (again) that surely there is some room for compromise where the public conservation estate can provide for the economic development of the country?
Well it does already, through the protection and restoration of the public estate in as clean and pristine state as possible. From 2004-2007, the public conservation estate returned some $22.5billion to communities. That return comes in many forms including flood protection (Whangamarino Wetland – $5million); water services (Te Papanui Conservation Park – $136million); tourism ventures (Fiordland National Park – $196 million), marine conservation (Otago Peninsula – at least $35 million pa). Not to mention the value of hydro schemes on pristine wild rivers.
And we haven’t even begun to calculate fully the public conservation estate contribution as a carbon sink. And we would have been able to make that calculation as the Greens had successfully negotiated some $8 million to research the carbon sink opportunitites of the public conservation estate. National cut that funding in this years budget.
National wants the rich to get much richer and will destroy not only our environment but the opportunities for sustainable economic development in a low carbon, oil constrained world. Old dinosaurs with old dinosaur thinking lead to nowhere but to a dinosaur non-future.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by Metiria Turei on Thu, August 27th, 2009
More posts by Metiria Turei | more about Metiria Turei
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
Planning to scar our conservation estate with mining pits in a misguided attempt to keep up with our wealthy Australian cousins. Do the Nats have any limits to the ludicrous lengths they will go to destroy our wilderness?
The Nats are driving at break neck speed to exploit the precious natural heritage that generations of New Zealanders have fought so hard to protect. Just yesterday they announced plans to privatise our high country lakesides in places like Wakatipu and Wanaka. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0908/S00388.htm
It shouldn’t come down to money but if it does, who has achieved the most economic gains for New Zealand – the mining companies (mostly Australian anyway) who plunder and pollute or the conservationists and communities who have created the enduring natural legacy that sustains our biggest export earner the tourism industry?
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Rachel – the article that ran in our rag on the ‘freeing up’ of lakesides was a tiny, tucked to the side, by-line, noticable only to the wary. Dirty play. Dirty players.
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I begin to fear the scope this new broom has granted itself to sweep away the protections put in place over the last decades. Their agenda is justified under the flag of ‘catching up’ lost OECD ground but the preferred solution seems to have little to do with added value/ knowledge & skills and much to do with expansion of commodity exports.
The long term effects of this will be counterproductive in economic as well as in ecological terms.
Opposion must be consistent, focused and emphatic.
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National wants the rich to get much richer and will destroy not only our environment but the opportunities for sustainable economic development in a low carbon, oil constrained world. Old dinosaurs with old dinosaur thinking lead to nowhere but to a dinosaur non-future.
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What a gift to the greens after being smacked by the referendum.
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See:
# toad (1496) Vote: Add rating 0 Subtract rating 4 Says:
August 28th, 2009 at 7:58 am
DPF, can I change my vote for Gerry Brownlee in your poll to “Very poor” following yesterday’s debacle?
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Every day the government erases some form of environmental protection. Wiped 54 million bucks from DOC’s budget – and is paying 48 million bucks on an untested, unproved selection of boot camps for young offenders?
What the National Government seems to be forgetting (and could do with you guys REMINDING them), is that tourism is our highest export earner and is a long-term financial investment. People travel here from all over the world, spending shitloads of money to visit our national parks and beautiful spots. digging a few holes in the ground and destroying our environment is not going to aid tourism marketing. i am disgusted.
Here’s where our ‘clean green’ country is going. PLEASE take action Green party and members. write to the Ministers, express your concern, don’t let apathy win out.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ambitious4NZ#play/all/uploads-all/0/FmeZgiw_a6w
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Well said pepeke.
Looks like the High Country Hijack is being cranked up again. The Minarets Station decision showed you can lease a 20k SU property, grossing $1m+ annually, for not much more than State House rates. And with luck and Tenure Review, you can get paid to take some prime lakeside real estate from the Crown, and flog it off for megabucks. Meantime you can deny access to trampers and climbers.
A handful of high country runholders have done, and will do, very very well out of this deal, which is slipping under the radar nicely.
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The BlueGreen AGM at Te Anau had, as the bulk of its audience, high country runholders, all looking smug.
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From a simple economic point of view; the resources we have underground aren’t going away and their value is only going one way in the foreseeable future so by leaving them there, it’s like money in the bank. Is there anyway that Key can show this on his balance sheet (preferably in hamburgers to keep Brownlee happy) to show what a great banker, I mean leader, he is?
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Ah yes greenfly, the BlueGreens. Like Federated Farmers, they have the press resources and boilerplate PR to present best farm practice as the norm.
The reality is somewhat different. With all due respect to those genuinely trying, many farmers are not. Lack of cash and/or motivation means continuing pollution and land degradation by erosion and gorse/broom/wilding pine invasion, across wide areas.
While DoC is being criticized (often quite incorrectly) for allowing this on Crown land, no serious studies are being done to assess private efforts. Financial data from farm surveys do not show large amounts spent on weed and pest control, on average, nor do any numbers in the recent PCE high country report.
A bit more honesty from farmers would help the whole debate. Continuing denial is steadily eroding sympathy from the rest of NZ.
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Bushbasher said:
Continuing denial is steadily eroding sympathy from the rest of NZ.
Curiously enough, recent research shows that sympathy from urban NZlanders for their farming brethren is high, while suspicion from farmers about their profile amongst townsfolk is equally high – townspeople regard farmers sympathetically, but farmers believe the opposite.
Odd.
a bit more honesty from farmers…
Don’t hold your breath Bushbasher. It’ll take sometime to clear away the self denial, let alone that to the broader community.
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Key says,
” Exploiting our mineral wealth will help close the wage gap with Australia”
haven’t he and Brash been having a constructive time during their visits across the ditch to rub shoulders with Rudd!
Southland District Mayor Frana Cardno calls the proposals ‘a disgrace’.
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That its then – we are at war! Down here on the West Coast – where mining interests are forever asserting that there’s gold in ALL them green hills it will never end now. The return to logging of lowland Podocarp forest is next..! It was lauded pre-election by the right wing candidate (cannot remember his name but it smells like fish!)
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THE CONSERVATION ESTATE
The Green Party support a partnership approach in the joint ownership and management of the conservation estate. This involves joint ownership (estate in fee simple) being vested in the Crown, and the iwi and hapu who are the traditional 1840 owners of the land. The Green Party completely oppose any privatisation of the conservation estate. Joint ownership must remain with the Crown, iwi, and hapu for perpetuity.
http://www.act.org.nz/news/the-green-party-treaty-and-maori-policy
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A key role of the Conservation Board in their region is to conduct education programs for Tauiwi* and Maori as to why endangered species in their region should be protected. For example, Kereru (wood pigeons) are an endangered species in the North Island and can only be saved by involving Maori in the education of their own people against continued poaching. However, in some regions (West Coast of the South Island), they are not endangered and a limited harvest should be acceptable.
*foriegner
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CONCESSIONS
The Green Party support iwi and hapu rights to economically benefit from the running of concession based businesses in the conservation estate. In order to provide for this, funding and business education and support will be made available (where independent resources are not available) to tangata whenua for the setting up of their own concession-based businesses. This should not come out of the DOC budget.
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Ahhhhh! tangata whenua are the ones for conserving the environment in Aotearoa
ps my Grandad was a farmer and conservationist (got an award in fact)
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So, jh, what does this have to do with opening the conservation estate up to mining and, in any case, what point are you trying to make?
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“Our Charter also explicitly accepts Te Tiriti o Waitangi as the founding document of this country, recognising Maori as Tangata Whenua. Part of the public discussion that has followed from the recent arrests in Ruatoki and elsewhere citing anti-terrorism laws has been an assertion of Tuhoe’s “sovereignty”. The sense of consternation from some quarters that has greeted this assertion must remind us that this preamble to our Charter is not just a form of empty words but rather a commitment to principle that demands our action.”
We are moving into a new phase of the collective national discussion about the Treaty, and as Greens we have a responsibility both to be an active and ethical voice in that discussion but also to work to equip others to participate in that discussion from an informed and principled basis, rather than sheer short term self interest.
Discussion to date has focused on the return of usually a small fraction of those resources unfairly taken from Maori as reparation, on reducing inequalities and on the rights of Maori as an ethnic and cultural minority with a threatened language and culture. While some of these issues have been addressed in part through the deliberations of the Waitangi Tribunal, these issues are, in fact, largely unrelated to the Treaty. If there were no Treaty, as there is not in a number of other societies around the world, these would all still be issues that would need to be addressed in a fair and just society.
The phase of the discussion that we now need to move into is one that that focuses on Maori status as the indigenous people of this country and on the actual content of the Treaty: a statement of the terms and conditions for the presence of non-Maori. The Maori right to self-determination pre-dated the Treaty and was not altered by it. What is at issue in understanding the Treaty are the rights of non-Maori.
Let us be clear that the meaning of the Treaty must be determined from the Maori text. Those writers of angry letters to the editor who cite the plain cession of sovereignty of the English text and declare “game over” in fact ignore the law, which makes it the responsibility of the party offering a contract to ensure that the party accepting it fully understands it. If disputes arise, interpretations of the contract are to be made according to the understanding of the accepting party rather than the party that drew up the contract.
Kevin Hague
The Queen of England confirms and guarantees to the chiefs & tribes and to all the people of New Zealand the possession of their lands, dwellings and all their property. But the chiefs of the Confederation and the other chiefs grant to the chiefs Queen, the exclusive right of purchasing such land as the proprietors thereof may be disposed to sell at such prices as shall be agreed upon between them and the persons appointed by the Queen to purchase from them.
it looks like a Ti Tiritti issue to me Sam. The Green Party should bug out?
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Mining technology has advanced somewhat and the impact on the environment is kept to a minimum.
But even if open cast mining took place, so what ? Trees grow back, in fact young trees absorb more carbon than old trees, so its a win win situation in my mind.
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Pretty poor (and ignorant) attitude their toasty.
Certain trees can take many generations to grow back not to mention the loss of habitat and the destruction of entire ecosystems.
I have a very good knowledge of the individuals in my region that would love to take advantage of this, and all they are is a pack of bloody vandals.
It doesn’t matter one iota whether modern mining practice is low impact, the problem is getting the miners to stick to it and they don’t.
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Good on ya!
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Left = bad
Treaty = really bad
Green = left + treaty = really, really bad
jh = paranoid
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Green = left + treaty = really, really bad
Green = Red Army advancing under brush.
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Shunda – your ‘pack of bloody vandals’ are slavering now that their masters have waved some ‘meat’ under their noses!
Still a fan, are you?
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QED
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Toastpilot seems chuffed to hear that Key and co. plan to drag ‘a wealth’ of lignite to the surface and …burn it. We’ll have parity with Australia, it’s promised, by hook or by crook. With Brash and his environmentally numb team calling the shots, my call is that it will be the latter.
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MINING LIKELY ON LAND CLAIMED BY IWI
Green party co leader Metria Turei says Maori have a right to feel galled by government moves to open up the DOC estate to mining.
Energy minister Jerry Brownlee yesterday called for a report to identify potential sites where restrictions on prospecting can be lifted.
Ms Turei says DOC land has been a major issue in treaty settlement talks, with many iwi seeking co-management or the outright return of conservation land.
“It’s really important too for our foreshore and seabed because some of these areas that are otherwise protected from mining are in the ocean and so we need to be really aware of protecting and having responsibility over those areas too,” Ms Turei says.
She says iwi want conservation land in their rohe kept in pristine condition, not degraded by mining efforts.
Waatea News
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What about the need for an economic base: in 1840 there were 60 to 70,000 Maori, now the numbers are much higher. Tangatawhenua might feel justified in exercising their tino rangitiratanga and do a bit of mining here and there (tangata whenua need to eat too!).
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the green Party honkies should stop tryng to dictate what tangatawheua should be able to do in their rohe and recognise their tino rangitiratanga under ti tirritti.
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Jh posted this
“Green party co leader Metria Turei says Maori …”
then this
“The green Party honkies should stop tryng to dictate..”
Have you not met Metiria jh?
(Her name should give you a clue – seems like you need one)
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The point Metiria makes where areas that are otherwise protected from mining are in the ocean is most interesting.
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I still don’t get why Toby Rihaka called Met’s and Catherine “mongrels”?
“It was a day for pissed off people-we had the first trespass notice
issued. Toby Rikihana took his opportunity to tell as exactly what he
thought about us-which was’nt terribly pleasant nor couched in niceties.
It is horrible being called a dummy and mongrels but to some extent why
not just let him rant and move on. I spoke to him afterward and he
didn’t really care, he got to tell as what he thought-which was the
point and the committee was generally irrelevant. Excellent attitude, I
think”
http://www.greens.org.nz/misc-documents/diary-debacle-archive-6th-september-15th-september
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Off topic, but I note the Crafar conviction and $90k fine for a string of dairy pollution offences. Alan Crafar quite unrepentent, blames the RMA!
Many hard-working (and compliant) dairy farmers in NZ will be cringing when they read this. Even Federated Farmers may disown the guy.
Perhaps the Sensible Sentencing Trust will get stuck in. After all, $90k is peanuts when you have 20k cows and an operation grossing $30m plus, even in a bad year. Petty cash. Should it have been $900k?
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I’m not sure I see what the problem is here. If you want minerals and stuff, you have to mine for it.
What’s particularly nonsensical is the belief that it is somehow even more wrong to mine for the stuff if it is on land that happens to be owned by the state.
Perhaps the Greens would look less hypocritical if they weren’t forever devising new schemes for spending ever more money. That wealth has to come from somewhere. If you think development should have stopped in 1950 then your spending plans should also be fixed at those levels: which, for example, means far lower water and environmental standards than we can afford today; and vastly lower spending on health and education.
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Does NZ have any rare minerals as are needed for high tech “clean energy”?
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Wat says:
I’m not sure I see what the problem is here.
I for one did a massive double-take when I read that!
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jh is on to it! There might be a metal in the middle of Kahurangi National Park that is vital for a medical device that could save the lives of thousands of children! We must support National in their (entirely fair) proposal to mine the national parks – for the sake of the children!
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With the stroke of a pen –
Areas of Significant Conservation Value will simply become Areas of Significant Commercial Value.
the methodology is cold calculative, and surgically precise, carried out many times in the past by vested interests.
Firstly by using a PR firm to publicise the amount of jobs the scheme will create, and how it will benefit the whole region or nation as whole.
Of course the developer will liaise closely with the Minister involved, and be speaking directly to the highest levels in DOC, making it very clear that they have deep pockets, and will pursue that matter as far as needed.
With that in mind, DOC will then proceed to look the other way, or not contest the developer. This does not bode well for any brave souls going as far as the Environment Court to defend the ASCV.
Two interesting parallels are the Sandplain forest on the West coast in the ’70s, and Whangamata (http://www.whangamata-marina.co.nz/?page_id=214 ) of recent times.
New Zealand has a very poorly disjointed database of ASCV’s, and as proven with Whangamata, If a developer has deep enough pockets, they can even interfere with the ratings of these ASCVs.
If the word comes from the Minister down, then predictably, DOC does not get involved. After that, it is a fairly summary execution for your A.S.C.V.
R.I.P.
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So, Not In My Back Yard then.
You’re all quite happy to use the stuff, provided you can feel pious by insisting it is all mined elsewhere, leaving us free to sanctimoniously indulge ourselves only in “green” jobs, such as basket weaving and software support (open-source only, natch.)
Whanga.Bar
- “the methodology is cold calculative, and surgically precise,…Firstly by using a PR firm to publicise the amount of jobs the scheme will create, and how it will benefit the whole region or nation as whole.”
I know, when I first looked at it I thought for a moment it was one of those Green Party press-releases claiming that so many thousands of new jobs will be created etc by switching to expensive solar power.
Of course, in this case they are actually real jobs, whereas what the Green Party talks about is overhead; a cost rather than a benefit. Big difference.
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I’d like my backyard to be intact, thanks wat, not pillaged, stripped bare, gutted, despoiled, hocked-off for short-term gain.
Intact.
Thanks.
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Think of it as community property. The Kids want to inherit some, the Husband wants to sell it off and buy a new car, the Wife wants to keep it in the family.
A decision made unilaterally doesn’t mean that the rest of us will agree. It may also lead to a lot more trouble within the family. Is it worth it to have a new car?
Basically, this is trampling on the property rights of a lot of New Zealanders.
Maybe they’d like to see the results of a referendum on this issue. A poll would be cheaper. I don’t think they will win much support outside a core constituency of Mother-Earth rapists.
respectfully
BJ
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Dear Wat,
thats right, not in my back yard, not with the deceptive techniques used by the mining industry. big business, and their hotline to Nick Smith and John Key. While much the same and worse goes on overseas, it does not mean We have to accept it in Godzone, although the way Nick operates, we have little choice.
You assume me happy to use the stuff?? Assume nothing.
Seal hunting and Whaling can easily be defended as providing “real jobs” just as an aluminium smelter can be lauded as providing several hundred “real jobs” (while gobbling up a quater of the country’s electricity output) or a couple of hundred jobs may be created chopping down beech forest on the West Coast. Heck, for the sake of “real Jobs” you could even legitimise Nazi death camps!
All pay homage to real jobs!!
By creating low impact jobs in areas (like tourism) the emphasis goes on preserving the attraction not destroying it.
Why do you want to compete with Western Australia? Immmm I can smell the Uranium dust on breath from here!
But perhaps you have a point, we could just tear the heart out of the Coromandel, make it an open cast pit mine and reminisce about the good old days of low impact adventure tourism.
I was born in North Wales UK, Slate mining use to be the big thing there, the mining companies charged in and turned it into a desolate landscape.
guess who replanted the trees when the companies left?
Yup, the local villagers, at their own cost. Pity about all the birds and bees though, pine trees on their own dont quite do it for me.
You dont know what you have got ’til its gone…
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Relax whanga.bar! Wat and his pro-mining cronies will soon be reassuring you that times have changed! The so-called ‘mining industry’ is long gone and forgotten, Modern ‘extraction’ methods have replaced the old rip-sh*t-and-bust open-cast, in-with-the-scrapers practices and now, ‘environmental improvement agents’ will magic the minerals (minerals are parasites that the earth is eager to be rid of!) right out of the ground, like liposuction! “Mother-earth is crying out for our help”, they’ll say, ” and we owe it to her to do our best to relieve her of her discomfort”.
Relax, whanga.bar. Lie back and listen to Uncle Wat.
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Our old mate Owen has been expressing himself freely on ‘another blog’.
# Owen McShane Says:
August 29th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
I would not like to think the stance on the DoC estate is just a smokescreen.
I have put many hours into advocating this policy and hope it is just a first step in a larger “whole of Government” reform of DoC and the DoC estate.
Good to see Tim and Gerry getting it right.
Time to get the deep greens under control.
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How cool, jh that you have trawled through my 2004 blog on the Foreshore and Seabed. But you have taken it so out of context that it makes for a silly reference in the context of this debate.
I remember Toby well, he called the supporters of the bill mongrels, not those of us who opposed it. Catherine wasn’t an MP then so he certainly wasnt refering to her, or to me or Tariana.
cheers, metiria
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Burn!
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Toby Rikihana took his opportunity to tell as exactly what he
thought about us-which was’nt terribly pleasant nor couched in niceties.
It is horrible being called a dummy and mongrels but to some extent why
not just let him rant and move on.
I remember Toby well, he called the supporters of the bill mongrels, not those of us who opposed it. Catherine wasn’t an MP then so he certainly wasnt refering to her, or to me or Tariana.
hmmmm?
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he wasn’t refering to me I hope?
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I would like to hear Owen expand a little.
Owen?
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oh you poor beggar shunda – OmcS will tell you we have an alternate Planet – ready and waiting.
Proof that people will believe anything that keeps them in their comfort zone….
If it weren’t for the likes of Fly – giving fresh apples away
i’d sign up too.
Ps: Fly? where has jh; gone?
Did he present any cogent thoughts?
Oh never Mind
You are Better than all that.
The Sheild is Heading south as I write
Scuzzzi…..must weep…heeheee.
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Mark – everything’s heading south, I reckon.
Nasty little nats, honing-in on our precious wild places,
the sniff of coal-smoke in their flared nostrils…
jh? He never minds me..I hover below his horizon and don’t bare addressing.
Cogent thoughts? Bound to be something in there, like lignite in a national park, buried, safe?
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You’ve earned the right to sneer greenfly but tell a naive young fella something, what the hell is the point of voting in this country? Has there ever been a time when politicians can be trusted to do the right thing? Or has it always been about see sawing between extremes in ideology?
Kinda seems pointless.
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People care more about the rugby than taking responsibility for what goes on in the world, Shunda. This makes us easily led by unscrupulous politicians and a media that panders to our fears (nanny state anyone?). Its not surprising they choose to exploit this given we make it so easy. You get what you pay for.
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Hey Shunda – I’ll match your naivety with mine – your questions are mine also. Ya’gotta vote though Shunda, or my side will leap one vote ahead (I’ll be dropping mine into the box 4sure!) I trust some politicians – those I have met personally and looked in the eye and one or two that I haven’t. There are a bevvy I mistrust passionately. Presently, those I don’t trust at all are having a field-day, lighting the bonfires Helen Clark warned about on election night. I don’t believe it’s pointless – more a battle fought in a House of Mirrors (I see you in there sometimes!)
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btw Shunda, you’ve mistaken my wry smile for a sneer – nobody has the right to be a sneerer.
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not bad – but i fear the truth may be worse than that – who is this polemic geek who pops up and Cries “Communusta?”"
Real backward ideology
Shunda: The PSA has always run NZ. Irrespective of who gets elected.
If the Clerk’s don’t like ya – yo’ done.
It really is time we had a congressional directional purpose.
If Pro is the opposite of Con
Then the opposite of Progress is?
“The victor will never be asked if he told the truth”: Adolf Hitler
“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our
problem is that numbers of people all over the world have obeyed the
dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and
millions have been killed because of this obedience. Our problem is that
people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation
and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand
thieves are running and robbing the country. That’s our problem.”:
Howard Zinn, from
‘Failure to Quit’
One doesn’t need to ponder long on the sacred ethic of “Covering one’s posterior” as being the Governing rule of Public Service.
This news will draw surprise, only for our reisdent Pet front-up 2 th Reds masxot – take a bow all dishonest, noxious stoolies, wherever you lie!
Silly really
Not as silly as the preoccupatoin
that our Leaders are somehow our servants
It may remain an eternal mystery to me – like why are SA Referee’s so consistently poor.
Wisdom is, if nothing else, the death of Illusion – and therein lies our Promise.
I am pleased and more than a little proud, to Vote Green and Green again.
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Sorry, not been well the last few days. Stress and the drugs I take to manage my aortic dissection do not go well together.
I refer to dark or deep greens not regular greens like myself I suppose.
There are serious problems with the DoC estate and its management going back to the origins during the Douglas reforms. I am surprised so many of seem convinced Roger got this one perfectly correct first time.
The CRMS report on the DoC Estate recommended it was long overdue for a regrading and classification. So my crown owned land was dumped into the DoC estate as a convenient bin. DoC controls or has certain rights over about half the land in NZ (including ecological units etc on private land). One might assume this would need about 30% of the population to properly manage it. This is why most countries aspire to about 10% of land in Conservation Estate.
We are special I know but the ever expansion of the DoC managed area means that DoC grows less effective by the day. DoC needs more resources to do its job. But the legislation is so limiting that they are unable to explore sensible options for more use and revenues. The US State and Federal Parks are much more sensibly managed. Go to the Centre paper at:
http://www.rmastudies.org.nz/issues/60-conservation-doc/98-the-role-of-the-department-of-conservation-and-the-need-for-change
The discussion opens with the premise that:
This restructuring should be driven by two major imperatives:
1. The inherent conflicts between conservation of
natural heritage, cultural heritage, general economic
development, exploration, mining, recreation and
tourism, should be resolved in an open and transparent
forum, rather than behind closed doors.
2. The Crown Lands within the Conservation Estate
belong to all New Zealanders and should be managed in
the interests of the nation as a whole, rather than in the
interests of one group driven by its own ideology.
This debate is long overdue.
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Sorry, not typing well still.
“I am surprised so many of seem …” should read “so many of you …”
“So my crown owned land …” should read “So much crown owned land ….”
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I agree that the DoC estate shouldn’t become religion. I supported (in spirit) the high walkway over the Hokitika Gorge for instance and a road through the Hollyford (tourists do a circuit rather than return trip to Queenstown.
Also why couldn’t people be licenced (genuine greenies) to live in the bush (ie homes) provided they trap etc?
As for mining if the resources were purposefully used (whereas present economic policy is growth for it’s own sake) I think it could be justified.
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A lot of green high tech requires rare earth minerals
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Metiria Turei says:
August 29, 2009 at 7:01 pm
“How cool, jh that you have trawled through my 2004 blog on the Foreshore and Seabed. But you have taken it so out of context that it makes for a silly reference in the context of this debate.”
excuse me you lot are treaty fundamentalists: bad pakeha and all that. The DoC estate is rohe.
“I remember Toby well, he called the supporters of the bill mongrels, not those of us who opposed it. Catherine wasn’t an MP then so he certainly wasnt refering to her, or to me or Tariana.
cheers, metiria”
It doesn’t read like that in the Diary: he called “us…..”, although on googling it was politicians and pakeha who were “immigrants” and got an earful; pretty much the same tone as Metiria and her fellow travellers irritate us with.
http://www.greens.org.nz/misc-documents/diary-debacle-archive-6th-sept ember-15th-september
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back in ’04, I saw a wee dog, with a tiny bone in his jaws and he was worrying it, shaking it, his little eyes wide, his wee voice strained…
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Bl**dy Taniwha.
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I like dogs
My dog is called Ralph
he is nice
end.
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I’ve got one in my roof.
He is called meeauowweee.
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In a very sparsely populated country like NZ you would not even know drilling and mining were going on unless you read about it, so actually we’re not even talking about “my back yard.”
Unless you eschew all use of extracted resources you are being nauseatingly hypocritical: you’ll accept all the benefits of other people getting their hands dirty drilling and mining in other countries, whilst feeling superior to them because it also means you get a nice “green” job for yourself.
Whanga.Bar,
- “You assume me happy to use the stuff?? Assume nothing.”
I can understand your coyness, but let’s not pretend that you lead an entirely self-sufficiently life of three acres and a cow, and knitted your PC and internet connection yourself.
bjchip,
- “Basically, this is trampling on the property rights of a lot of New Zealanders.”
Oh the irony: redistributionist eco-fascists citing property rights.
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“..you would not even know drilling and mining were going on..”, says wat.
Despite this being the ideal scenario for the pro-mining frat (hard-hatted and shiney-ars*d alike), we do know and continue to seek to know. We won’t, wat, close our eyes and think of England.
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Re the queries as to what we actually have.
According to GNS Northland has many areas likely to contain substantial quantities of the rare earths needed to manufacture micro chips etc and which will also be useful (we suspect) in nano technology. The costs of raw materials count. One of the reasons Buckley engineering still manufactures a huge percentage of the magnets used to focus ion beam in the manufacture of silicon chips (technology all developed by New Zealanders – my friends – who now work in the US) is because high quality copper is cheaply available from Australia. When we ship it to the NZ in these magnets the copper is extremely high value added.
Goto: http://www.ionbeams.com/Pictures.htm
Then there are the extreme thermophiles living in our boiling water and mud pools in geothermal areas many of which are in the conservation estate.
Then our geothermal steam provides very high purity silica for silicon based industries. But I suppose our most valuable chemicals are the proteins we “mine” from agricultural organs and blood etc which is based on our low disease pastoral farming. eg pig cells used for diabetes treatment.
Because technology develops all the time today’s worthless element can be tomorrows priceless item.
But the immediately valuable metal deposits are gold mainly. Bill Gardner’s prospect on the West Coast has a higher density of gold than the klondyke. A few hectares is estimated to have $300,000,000 worth of gold. It’s alluvial and seamed and comes out in big lumps. He cannot get permission to access it along a 1 km track. The cost benefit analysis seems weird to me.
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So to summerise then, you’ll carry on enjoying all the benefits that flow from drilling and mining, whilst at the same time declaiming how ghaaastly is all is daaarling.
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So to summarise then, you’ll carry on making shallow and pointless comments on Frogblog, Wat dear?
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I’ll take that as a yes.
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I think Owen has some valid points there, from my own dealings with D.O.C it is clear that the current management of conservation estate is not sustainable long term. The problem is some of the people keen on exploiting these resources are nothing more than professional vandals. A local councilor down here (his wife is the electorate secretary for the national party) is also involved in the mining industry. He has long bemoaned the lack of access to DOC estate and has written many a whinge in the local rag (he sounds like a whining 8 year old boy) about being denied access to his “precious”.
These guys have no respect for the environment and a sense of entitlement bigger than any beneficiary (which of coarse they also bemoan) I have seen the result of there “test” bores and can tell you they care not a sausage about the damage they cause.
Any policy changes would HAVE to keep these vandals in check.
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“The US State and Federal Parks are much more sensibly managed. Go to the Centre paper at:”
Owen, you call yourself a green and yet advocate the introduction of conservation estate management practices from the UNITED STATES with its incestuos relationship between the public sector and the corporate extractive industry who are provided with tremendous amounts of subsidies to destroy the landscape purportedly under its stewardship.
In the United States the Forest Service was spending $427 a year, building roads for private corporations so that they can access public lands and extract timber below cost with devastating effects on its landscape where only 28% of its Old Growth Forests remain.
It provides free rights-of-way for oil and gas pipeland networks (would be prohibitively expensive if they run through private lands no?) as well as targetted taxbreaks to reduce the capital cost (in the “national interest) of course.
Not to mention the amounts provided to other extractive industries such as Oil and Gas producers, costs (at least fiscal ones) which are admittadly offset by the royalty fees provided to the Federal Government under the Mineral Leasing Act (1920).
“The U.S. government provided net subsidies of between $5.2 and $11.9 billion to the oil sector during 1995, excluding the cost of defending Persian Gulf oil supplies. We estimate defense of oil supplies to be worth an additional $10.5 to $23.3 billion, demonstrating the magnitude of this specific subsidy element. Thus, our estimate for net federal subsidies to oil, including defense, is $15.7 to $35.2 billion for 1995. Because of the sensitivity of our totals to the defense subsidy, we present our results both with and without this item.”
http://archive.greenpeace.org/climate/oil/fdsub.html
There is some SERIOUS cognitive dissonance going on there.
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Sleepy tree hugger
You are quite correct about the Federal Government and Forestry in particular.
But having driven for three months around the US in the last sixties and been back many times to visit the State Parks I have been mightily impressed by their management of the parks and their ability to provide both recreational access and promote conservation.
Nothing is perfect and they have made blunders. But my comments are based on life experience camping for three months. You quote statistics.
Are you so sure the Big Sur is a a wasteland, along with the Needles, or Grand Canyon, or thel Bandalier National Monument and the forests of Oregon and the whole Four Corners region. My family experience of wildness in the US could not be matched in New New Zealand. Go and see for yourself.
And wildness is not a typo.
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“Nothing is perfect and they have made blunders.”
Its not that they’ve made blunders, its the fact that its political regime has been shaped to serve the imperatives of profit-driven capitalist economic system. Its fortunate for the U.S. that its nominally a democratic society and that large sectors U.S. are willing and able to hold the politicians accountable for what takes place within their neighbourhoods.
Such as in the case of the Big Sur you talked about.
“The company began mining the area in 1981, obtaining approval under an 1872 federal law. Federal regulations require mining companies to comply with federal and state environmental standards for air and water quality, solid waste, scenic values and fish and wildlife habitat.”
The company challenged the state permit requirement in federal court. A federal District Court ruled against the company, but the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision. Circuit Judge J. Clifford Wallace, writing for a unanimous three-member panel, declared: “An independent state permit system to enforce state environmental standards would undermine the Forest Service’s own permit authority and thus is preempted.”
http://articles.latimes.com/1986-04-01/news/mn-1523_1
Though one would have thought the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 would have eclipsed the Mining Act of 1872, which was enacted because, “On September 17, 1909, the director of the U.S. Geological Survey reported to the secretary of the interior that companies acting under the General Mining Law were claiming the petroleum deposits of the public lands in California at such a rate that it would “be impossible for the people of the United States to continue ownership of oil lands for more than a few months. After that, the Government will be obliged to repurchase the very oil that it has practically given away.”
http://www.enotes.com/major-acts-congress/mineral-leasing-act
btw way the mining company still owns the peak of Big Sur though they have currently halted their operations due to pressure from environmental advocacy organisations in the 1970s and 1980s.
“My family experience of wildness in the US could not be matched in New New Zealand. Go and see for yourself.”
I am planning on visiting the wilderness areas in the U.S. at some stage and have contemplated doing a course at the Wilderness Awareness School in the Pacific Northwest. Offsetting my carbon emissions of course, lol.
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Bomber says it well on Tumeke!
“Remember all the spectacular scenery in the Lord of the Rings, I’m going to dig the lot up for foreign owned mining companies so that it really will look like Mordor: Key-miester on his game!”
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well i’m ok about a snowy alpine home – oceans rise should make these zones, underwater curiousities.
Certainly losing, say , Wellington, Auckland – would be no loss to the great nation.
None of these Guys have been Ministers
I recommend research of the Brethren to gain translation
meanwhile …..back at the saloon.
Wellington always was refugeee status – you live there cos you have to.
Do not Give Up – virtually anywhere is an improvement.
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Remeber when environmental groups were a political: Save Manapouri etc
http://tinyurl.com/le89ta
Today most people are unaware of groups such as the Environmental Defence Society why?: the limelight has been grabbed by our very own Green Party of Aotearoa NZ but with said entity you get the dregs of left-wing politics in control. The same old people who shouted “take a walk come on down and see the pigs who run our town” while in the PYM and members of left-wing families who were famous (but respected for their honest stance). The Green Party has weakend the environmental movement.
As for the a Lord of the Rings Analogy , the Shire was overun long ago when our property market was globalised and we had a flood of migrants for the benefit of the property sector.
Conservationists: Yeah Right
http://nbr.infometrics.co.nz/column.php?id=409
http://www.boston.com/travel/articles/2004/11/07/new_zealand_at_a_crossroads/
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