It is another example of practical thinking and application in an area that relied, to be frank, on laziness to solve a problem.
Ever since we became obsessed with climate change and we became obsessed with things that might or might address climate change, the low hanging fruit has been trees and carbon markets.
Carbon markets, as we have seen yet again this year, don't work. The government has mucked with the rules, changed the prices, freaked the market out, and all the credits that go up for sale by and large don’t get sold.
They all pile into the next auction and don’t get sold until they get to the fourth auction of the year where, after they aren't sold again, they then get dumped.
Dumped as in they never actually existed in the first place. It’s a mad, invented idea that only works if people believe it works.
So far they don’t.
Then we plant trees. Why? Because it's easy.
So a paddock of trees - or a paddock of sheep, or crops, or cows.
In a country where we already build too many houses on productive land, planting trees on that sort of land is criminal and stupid.
What this country does is feed the world. Our ability on quality in many areas is unmatched, and we get the price return for it.
But, and here is where the old freedom of movement thing comes in, if you have 100 hectares and you want to sell it and the person who wants to plant trees is offering more than the bloke next door who wants to expand his farm and keep sheep, you are now potentially limited by a government that has decided for you what you do with your property.
That’s always a tricky area.
Ultimately though governments must act in these circumstances on behalf of the nation and if we weren't so reliant on food production, if we were a tech centre, or a space centre, or an oil centre of a strategic global base like Singapore or Dubai, it might be different.
But land is our calling card and one day we will work out trees aren't the answer to climate change.
But by the time we work that out re-converting wont be possible, so in that sense this decision has saved us from ourselves.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
They all pile into the next auction and don’t get sold until they get to the fourth auction of the year where, after they aren't sold again, they then get dumped.
Dumped as in they never actually existed in the first place. It’s a mad, invented idea that only works if people believe it works.
So far they don’t.
Then we plant trees. Why? Because it's easy.
So a paddock of trees - or a paddock of sheep, or crops, or cows.
In a country where we already build too many houses on productive land, planting trees on that sort of land is criminal and stupid.
What this country does is feed the world. Our ability on quality in many areas is unmatched, and we get the price return for it.
But, and here is where the old freedom of movement thing comes in, if you have 100 hectares and you want to sell it and the person who wants to plant trees is offering more than the bloke next door who wants to expand his farm and keep sheep, you are now potentially limited by a government that has decided for you what you do with your property.
That’s always a tricky area.
Ultimately though governments must act in these circumstances on behalf of the nation and if we weren't so reliant on food production, if we were a tech centre, or a space centre, or an oil centre of a strategic global base like Singapore or Dubai, it might be different.
But land is our calling card and one day we will work out trees aren't the answer to climate change.
But by the time we work that out re-converting wont be possible, so in that sense this decision has saved us from ourselves.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
6 comments:
Yes Mike, it will be too late to save our precious arable farmland. This is the engine room of our economy which is quickly becoming the sacrificial lamb to the climate gods nonsense. While our gutless politicians, past and present, aided by the corrupt MSM, fail to challenge the greatest lie ever told, our future generations will pay dearly. Will these hollow men dip their toes in the water when Trump wisely divorces the US from the Paris Climate Accord? I won’t be holding my breath.
A good assessment of where we are Mike but may l add a couple of observations that reflect the feelings of those living and working at the coalface.
The carbon economy has only ever been justified by those Climate Change Zealots who see it as an acceptable painless way of reducing our greenhouse gas emissions without imposing drastic restrictions on the activities of the urban voters.
Prior to its introduction, the expansion of the forestry estate was controlled by a law limiting the planting of pine trees to classes 6 and 7 marginal hill country.
Unfortunately that bi-law was eliminated from the statutes and the whole country land bank became vulnerable to overseas investors who were only interested in the better country ( flat to rolling ) where they could maximise their investment with high density plantings.
As the plantings began to move almost exclusively onto our best grazing land
and even some of our best arable land alarm bells began to ring with representations to the Labour Government ministers being made almost on a daily basis - all to no avail. Alas the Greenies were in charge of our economic
and environmental policies.
Our protests suggested that there was still enough classes 6 and 7 marginal hill country in order for the nation to reach its 2050 emissions reduction target without using any of the top land that has been planted before or since.
It has been clear for years that the carbon economy has been an obsolete blunt instrument used to achieve political objectives that has outlived its usefullness and should be discontinued.
Unfortunately, the National led government has only half closed the door after the horse has bolted.
While the recent legislation will succeed in limiting the forestry expansion to land where it is the best type of farming operation, it will not return any of the best land to the people who should be farming it in the best interests of all New Zealanders. The only people benefitting from a continuation of the programme are mostly foreign owners of our best farming real estate and they don’t give a damn what happens to any of us.
Too little too late but that’s politics in this country.
It was a good move by Todd McClay this morning when he spoke to Mike.
https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/todd-mcclay-agriculture-minister-on-the-panel-recommending-new-zealand-reduce-its-2050-climate-target/
The 5 person methane panel seem a lot more qualified then the outgoing Climate Change Commission.
I met Todd again last week at Mystery Creek. He was quite approachable.
Let us hope that mean a change for National and not more of this climate emergency or crisis hysteria.
Well said Clive. But how to push back? So far Luxon is showing quite a tendency to believing in “the podium of truth” approach.
A good analysis by Mike here, and it reflects the concerns that farmers have been expressing for some time, as the carbon market has alarmingly accelerated the expansion of blanket pine plantings over quality pastoral land, usually engulfing whole farms. Prior to the introduction of the ETS, the pastoral/pine interface was reasonably stable and accepted, though pine expansion was always causing concern when good pastoral land was converted. Now it has become alarming and at last the government is acting to address it.
It is not just the concern at the contraction of our food-producing estate, but the effect on the social infrastructure that family-owned farming has provided, but the value, emotional and economic, of the agriculture vista, so highly admired by Kiwi and visitor alike.
Having said that, I do not go along with the above comments that dismiss, even ridicule, climate change that confronts the planet and its implications for the life of those that follow us. Those that express concerns about this are not ‘zealots’, the politicians are not ‘gutless’, nor the MSM’ corrupt’. This is, surely, the ultimate challenge facing the international community. There is no simple solution. The ETS is a well-meaning attempt to reward carbon sequestration at the expense of the emitters. Now we are seeing the unforeseen consequences.
My dictionary defines a zealot as a “fanatic or an extreme enthusiast”
Sounds like the supporters of the IPCC mantra to me.
In fact in certain quarters anyone who is sceptical of even some of the evidence supporting climate change is instantly labeled a “climate change denier.”- myself included. It would appear that there is no room for those who question the totality of the current dogma.
Wonder how Galileo, Malcolm Muggeridge and Darwin would have fared at the latest climate change conference?
Not too well l suspect
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