Category: Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A cross-sector group concerned about the impact of forestry in Tai Rāwhiti is urging the government to stump up $359 million.

The transition advisory group, known as TAG, was established in response to a ministerial inquiry, which labelled the problem an “environmental disaster”, and is tasked with transitioning 100,000 hectares of land back into permanent bush to stabilise its most vulnerable slopes.

Members include forestry owners, Māori landowners, farmers and experts from Gisborne District Council and Ministry for Primary Industries.

• Over 20 percent of Tai Rāwhiti is covered in pine trees, many were planted after Cyclone Bola in 1988 to help with erosion control as the region has the most slip-prone land in New Zealand.
• The region’s steep hill country loses 55 million tonnes of topsoil every year and post-storm clean-ups (Cyclone Gabrielle and subsequent events) have exceeded $110 million in debris and sediment removal alone.
• It’s estimated that without intervention, cumulative storm-related damages over the next 30 years could exceed $1 billion.
• It was so bad in 2023 after Cyclone Gabrielle and Hale that a ministerial inquiry into land use was launched, it found lives were put at risk, and said the time to fix this “environmental disaster” is running out. It recommended planting the worst areas back into native bush.
• In response, a TAG was set up and has identified up to 100,000 hectares of forestry and pastoral land that needs to be taken out of production and planted in permanent bush.

The cost of transitioning this land was initially estimated to need $200m of government funding, however the figure has grown to nearly double that.

“We’re looking at $359m of Crown co-investment over the next 10 years and this is backed by our own regional, private, and also philanthropic funding that is already flowing into the region,” Gisborne District Council chief executive Nedine Thatcher Swann said.

“What our business case shows, though, is that for every $1 spent, we actually save $4 on the recovery. This programme is about avoiding more than $1 billion in future storm damage and recovery costs.

“It is about ensuring that we’re putting investment into preventative work rather than being the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff, literally picking up large woody debris when the next event happens.

“It’s not an if, it’s a when,” she said.

The business case sets out a 30-year plan to stabilise around 100,000 hectares of erosion-prone land. It includes a $20.5m early-start package to begin work in the most at risk-areas and proposes a $359m Crown investment over ten years, as well as regional and private contributions estimated at more than $240m.

The group has sent the proposal to the prime minister and minister for Primary Industries.

“We have had conversations with them, and we understand that we’re in an incredibly tight economic times,” Thatcher Swann said.

However, she said the plan will save money in the long run.

The group is urging the government to seriously consider the implications of what will happen if Tai Rāwhiti’s current land use doesn’t change.

“Our region agrees that we do need to transition some of the most vulnerable land to permanent cover and we’re ready to go. The plan’s in place, our partnerships are strong, the momentum is real and we just need the Crown to come and back us.”

A spokesperson for Forestry Minister Todd McClay said that the case study has been received and will be evaluated as part of ongoing work in relation to sustainable land use.

“Unfortunately the group’s expectation of taxpayer support seems unrealistic, however no decisions have been made at this stage,” they said.

Government no ‘white knight’ for landowners

Dan Jex-Blake farms in the Waingake Valley about 50 kilometres away from Gisborne and is part of the TAG. He’s experienced the impacts of forestry slash on his land and is keen to see the problems with land use addressed.

“We need to change the way our land is used in this region because the material damage caused to those downstream, certainly from forestry, is huge,” he said.

But he’s realistic when it comes to government funding.

“As a landowner I’m not thinking the government is going to be a white knight and come along and pay for everything,” he said.

However, the farmer told RNZ what will help is commercial opportunities to incentivise the changes.

“That could put up an economically rationale and logical case for landowners to go ‘that piece of land is not sustainable for long term farming or trees and there are options to get other income from it’.

“If we don’t do something it’s an indictment on us as a generation … the goal is aspirational but we need to get on and get going with it,” he said.

Farm consultant and chief executive of Tairawhiti Whenua Charitable Trust, Hilton Collier, is also in the TAG.

“There’s certainly a lot of ambition and a lot of hope for better outcomes.

“It’s been a challenging journey and there’ve been some very difficult discussions at times given the tensions between farming and forestry,” he said.

Collier said ultimately everyone agrees a better relationship with Tai Rāwhiti’s land is needed to reduce and mitigate excessive sedimentation and woody debris entering waterways.

But he warns that land use transition will take time, and people must be patient.

“We won’t get an instant fix and everyone needs to understand we are not going to have a solution tomorrow. It’s probably going to take 20 to 50 years, or longer, before we have the issue addressed properly.”

‘We have concerns’: Eastland Wood Council

Eastland Wood Council chairperson Julian Kohn, who also a TAG member, said Gisborne forest owners recognise that land-use transition is needed, particularly around vulnerable land that’s been identified.

“But we have concerns. The business case understates the potential risks to our region’s economy and we believe landowners need to be considered more – this transition includes land owned by iwi as well as mum and dad investors around our country.

“We also think poplars, willows, redwoods and other timber should be included in the replanting along with natives for the permanent vegetation,” he said.

Outside of the land use change, Kohn said there is still a place for sustainable forestry in Tai Rāwhiti.

“The forestry industry wants to be part of the answer to keeping soil on the hills, protecting waterways, and supporting our region’s economy.

“This region recently had a sawmill reopen which created 110 jobs. Our port, heavily reliant on forestry, is also undergoing a multi‑million‑dollar upgrade for its Twin Berth Project,” Kohn said.

He’s confident there is capacity in the region to support the forestry industry, and said Eastland Wood Council wants to be part of the future of Tai Rāwhiti.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

More people are listening to Radio New Zealand, with the broadcaster saying it has hit a target for live listeners a year ahead of schedule.

GFK survey figures released on Tuesday show 500,300 in a typical week for RNZ National aged 10 or older, up from 475,800 in the last survey.

“We’ve achieved our November 2026 goal a year early with these latest results, and we now want to build on that success in 2026,” RNZ chief executive Paul Thompson said.

RNZ’s flagship programme Morning Report has 13,000 more listeners, a rise of 4 percent.

“Further changes to programming and the introduction of new presenters and correspondents in 2026 will help confirm RNZ National as the home of trusted news and content for New Zealanders,” Thompson said.

Auckland has by far the biggest lift in live radio listeners, up 16,700 from 116,000 last survey to 132,700 in the latest figures.

There was growth in all major programmes.

Morning Report had 13,600 more listeners across the country, Nine to Noon 20,200 more, Checkpoint another 18,100 and Saturday Morning 4,400.

RNZ National and RNZ Concert have a combined weekly audience of 584,300 listeners.

The two have a 12.7 percent combined share, up from 11.3 percent.

However, RNZ Concert had 154,100 listeners which was down from 170,400 in the last survey.

RNZ said when all its platforms are combined, it is now reaching 83 percent of New Zealanders a month aged 18 or over.

Separately, it has also had back-to-back record digital growth in digital viewers.

A total of 1,698,000 New Zealanders aged 15+ visited rnz.co.nz in October, the highest ever monthly audience for RNZ’s website following another record month in September.

The survey, known as Survey 3, was conducted between 10 August and 1 November.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Regional councillors who’ve just been sworn in have been shown the writing on the wall by the government, which is plotting a swift end to their terms

It’s been billed as the biggest shakeup in local government since amalgamation in 1989.

But at the end of the day, “all the government’s really announced is work to start a brain storming session,” says Stuff political reporter Glenn McConnell.

Simpler, more cost-effective local government is the stated aim from the ministers involved; local government minister Simon Watts and the man in charge of resource management reform, Chris Bishop.

The media release from the Beehive didn’t mention the word ‘amalgamation’ once, but that’s effectively what it will end up being.

“It is a huge announcement,” McConnell tells The Detail, “because it’s effectively a key part of New Zealand’s democracy … regional councils, local government being completely overhauled, reformed, so that … probably the next time a local government election comes up, you won’t be voting for who is on your regional council.”

He says it’s probably fair to say this is effective amalgamation but “the government hasn’t come out and said ‘we want to amalgamate all these councils; we want to merge regional and district councils across the country’.”

There are 11 regional councils in New Zealand – Auckland, Marlborough and the Chatham and subantarctic islands don’t have them.

McConnell says Chris Bishop raised a pretty good point when he asked if people actually know who they’re voting for on a regional council – who can name the councillors?

He adds that local government voting percentages are so low that you could ask if the democratic process is even working that well, with less than half the population participating.

On the other hand, the chair of Environment Canterbury, Deon Swiggs, has told him that locals are well engaged in his area and do know what’s happening.

“So maybe that’s a good example of this new system that everyone is going to need to think about. We could have, depending on engagement in the areas, and the concerns raised, different voting systems.”

McConnell says local government in New Zealand is a complex system and simplifying it will be a complicated job. He also points out that the country’s busy mayors didn’t sign up for this.

The first step is to replace regional councillors with the mayors who cover those regions, on what will be called Combined Territories Boards, and they have two years to work out what the decision-making structures will look like in the future.

One irony here is that Prime Minister Christopher Luxon campaigned on giving more power to locals to make decisions, in a bite-back to Labour’s Three Waters changes.

McConnell says in a way, this move is not dissimilar.

“This is the same rationale as having Three Waters, that you could combine resources across different cities and regions to make it more effective and cheaper to operate local government services. That is the same rationale that Chris Bishop is using for pushing for this reform of regional councils.”

Bishop has been very interested in this area and has been open with his desire to reform it.

National has backing from both its coalition parties, but interestingly for different philosophical reasons.

“The politics of this is quite fascinating,” says McConnell.

New Zealand First’s Shane Jones has effectively made getting rid of regional councils a party policy – “particularly he’s unhappy about the Otago Regional Council, which he said is a ‘Kremlin-like institution’ in the South Island, all because he doesn’t like the decisions they’re making.”

Act, on the other hand, sees it as a way to get rid of co-governance.

“In Canterbury, ECan has seats for Ngāi Tahu – Ngāi Tahu representation is guaranteed on the ECan board – now this change, getting rid of the board that runs ECan and just replacing it with mayors, means that Ngāi Tahu representation is gone.

“So Act is celebrating from the perspective of getting rid of co-governance. Three completely different reasons for this policy.

“But this is going to take years to change this … I think this discussion will be going on for quite some time.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A corporate healthcare provider has hit back on Labour’s claims that it doesn’t prioritise community needs.

On Sunday, the party announced a policy that would offer doctors and nurse practitioners low-interest loans to set up new practices or buy into existing ones, if elected next year.

The loans would only be available for owner-operated general practices, with corporate-owned clinics excluded.

Labour’s health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall told Morning Report on Monday that although many corporate-owned practices provided good care, there were instances where priority was not given to community needs.

She used an example in Lower Hutt where the practice gave up on doing face-to-face consultations because they had taken all the funding that comes with enrolling a large patient population and then not hired the doctors to support that.

Tend Health founder and co-chief executive Cecilia Robinson said Verrall’s comment were “pretty odd”.

“I think it’s a pretty odd assertion, it’s not reflective of the data, you know, continuity of care is actually design assured, it’s not an ownership issue, and it really relies on having enough clinicians, modern systems and a model built around long-term relationships with patients.

“So it’s a strange assertion and I think what’s important to discuss is continuity of care which is incredibly important but true continuity of care also depends on the quality of the data, the broader care team supporting our GPs and consistent prescribing practices. That’s really what we need to ensure a safe, seamless patient experience.”

Robinson said Tend was focused on creating access for patients and moving clinicians depending on where demand is highest and patients accessing care in a location that is convenient to them.

“Our patients have a higher satisfaction once we’ve integrated a practice into Tend’s network than what they did pre an integration under a previous ownership structure and why is that? It’s because patients can now access their care that they need in a timely way in a price that is right for them.”

Robinson said there had been a “significant” shift in patient satisfaction, with its data showing it rise from 60 percent to 95 percent.

It was also experiencing a broader enrolment cohort – with an increased number of Māori and Pasifika enrolments.

Robinson said its Bay of Plenty practices had gone from 12 percent enrolment of Māori patients to surpassing 22 percent.

“This is real impact in real communities where patients are making decisions around the healthcare that is best for them.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A person has been seriously injured and a manhunt is under way after a Christchurch robbery.

Police were called to the scene at a business on Opawa Road about 5.40am on Tuesday.

By the time they got there, the alleged offenders had fled.

Police said they were working to find those responsible.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Relying on trees to offset New Zealand’s emissions years into the future is putting “a significant number of eggs in one basket”, the Climate Change Commission chair has warned politicians.

New trees would need to be “in the ground” within a couple of years and could still be destroyed by forest fire or extreme weather events – wiping out their carbon savings.

Appearing before Parliament’s environment select committee on Monday, commission chief executive Jo Hendy was questioned about the “significant risks” the commission identified earlier this year when it came to meeting the country’s emissions budgets.

Emissions budgets are set by the government, taking into account advice from the commission.

They establish the total net emissions the country can produce over a five-year period and still keep its domestic and international climate goals on track.

In its annual emissions monitoring report released earlier this year, the commission said there were risks to meeting the second budget (2026-30) and third budget (2031-35).

One of those risks was relying on forest removals of carbon dioxide to meet nearly half of the 2031-35 emissions budget.

In response to questioning from Green Party climate change spokesperson Chlöe Swarbrick, Hendy said there were two main implications of that approach.

“The first implication is you need those forests in the ground quickly for that carbon to then start sequestering,” she said.

“The other is risks around things like fires and storms – you know, another Cyclone Gabrielle taking a big hit out of that forestry. Then you’ll be faced with a difficult situation where you might not be able to meet the budget.”

Researchers have started to warn that many of the natural carbon sinks that society relies on to soak up emissions are now sometimes releasing more carbon than they absorb.

Swarbrick asked Hendy if she could explain the commission’s remarks that “the reliance on forests for a large proportion of emissions reduction is likely to increase the long-term cost of meeting the 2050 target and increase impacts on future generations”.

That was because using forestry to offset emissions created less of an incentive for businesses and communities to limit the amount of greenhouse gases produced in the first place, Hendy said.

“As a result, we don’t get as much decarbonisation in the economy.

“When you don’t get as much decarbonisation in the economy – what we’re talking about is electrification of industry, for example – you are missing out on those economic benefits of reduced costs.”

The commission has long recommended that New Zealand “decarbonise where possible”.

“Relying heavily on forestry might help Aotearoa meet its 2050 emissions reduction targets but it would make maintaining net zero long-lived emissions beyond that date more difficult,” it told the previous government in 2021.

“It would delay people taking actions that reduce gross emissions, lead to higher cumulative emissions and push the burden of addressing gross emissions on to future generations.”

Tougher methane target was feasible, affordable, achievable

The committee also asked Hendy about the government’s decision to revise New Zealand’s 2050 methane emissions target.

In October, the government said it would scrap previous plans to introduce agricultural emissions pricing by 2030, and would pass legislation to lower the 2050 methane target from a 24-47 percent reduction from 2017 levels, to a 14-24 percent reduction, in line with a ‘no additional warming’ policy.

National MP Grant McCallum, a Northland beef and dairy farmer, asked what the impact would be on the rural sector if the current target was retained, if there was no technology available to help farmers reduce their methane emissions.

“One of the key considerations when we do our scenario work for emissions budgets is impact on rural communities,” Hendy said.

“We found that it was a feasible and affordable and technically achievable, in our previous emissions budget advice at the end of last year.”

The upper end of the range could be achieved with new technologies, while the 24 percent low end of the range was based on technology that was already available, and changes to farming practices.

There was a “good pipeline” of methane-inhibiting technology, she said.

“The key point will be making sure that it can be deployed on farms.

“Not necessarily every tool will work on every farm. It’s really about making sure that farmers are enabled to work with the tools that work for them.”

McCallum asked Hendy and commission chair Dame Patsy Reddy twice about whether New Zealand should remain a signatory to the Paris Agreement.

“Does the commission have a view or has it given any consideration to the cause of some people who think we should pull out of the Paris Accord [sic]?”

Part of the commission’s mandate was based on the agreement, Dame Patsy said.

“It’s not our place to have a view.”

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has repeatedly said the government was committed to the Paris Agreement and New Zealand’s emissions targets, despite a push from coalition partner ACT to leave the pact.

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