government Archive

  • frog

    Iceland’s Government – Greens to the rescue? - by frog



    Should I be happy? The glass is half full: a fellow Green Party has helped form a coalition government at the national level. The glass is half empty:  it’s in Iceland, a very small country with a very large economic crisis.  Iceland’s financial meltdown is of biblical proportions.  Cue the locusts. And cue the Greens, [...] read more
    February 5, 2009 4:36 pm - 67 Comments
  • frog

    Michael Pollan on Food, Energy and Health - by frog



    Hat tip to O’Reilly Radar for leading me to this video of Michael Pollan speaking at the Web 2.0 Summit last month. Pollan tells it like it is – that agriculture is the key to tackling climate change and many other modern ills. Food is the shadow problem if they [the politicians] hope to deal [...] read more
    December 16, 2008 4:39 pm - 11 Comments
  • Russel Norman

    MAF warns Government - by Russel Norman



    In the paper this morning I referred to the MAF briefing to the incoming Government released yesterday.The Government’s press release chose to focus on bland reassertion of the fact that agriculture is the back-bone of the economy as if someone had forgotten. Far more topical is the briefing’s sage advice for our climate change negotiators [...] read more
    December 2, 2008 2:22 pm - 23 Comments
  • Russel Norman

    National rejects expert advice? - by Russel Norman



    Yesterday I was informed that a number of officials have been dumped from the New Zealand Government delegation to the climate change talks in Poznan, Poland [PDF factsheet]. Apparently, a number of senior officials from the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry for the Environment who were all set to attend to advice our Ministers [...] read more
    December 2, 2008 2:16 pm - 40 Comments
  • frog

    Winston’s credibility - by frog



    Like people from most corners of the political spectrum, defending Winston Peters doesn’t come naturally to me. But in this case I think he probably does deserve some support. Kiwiblog, Whale Oil, the Hive and others are all calling for Peters to resign following his announcement that NZ First will not be supporting the Preferential [...] read more
    April 9, 2008 8:15 am - 21 Comments
  • frog

    Electric Cars and Behaviour Change - by frog



    While I fully support the government’s vision to move New Zealand to an electric vehicle fleet, at least in principle, I have often wondered what kind of behaviour changes this would require of the citizenry. I have also enquired how much more electricity generation we would need to make the switch. The off the record [...] read more
    March 18, 2008 9:16 am - 23 Comments