Danny Simms: Threats to New Zealand’s Agricultural Export Industry

In New Zealand we are seeing a seismic shift in land use. If it was based on straight economics, we should accept it. However it is not. Vast areas of productive farmland is being taken out of production and planted in pine trees.

This is being driven exclusively by industry using our land to offset their carbon emissions.

 The carbon credit subsidy driven rush to plant tens of thousands of hectares of productive farmland in pine trees must stop.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: I'm not feeling sorry for forestry owners over new slash rules

Here's some good news, we've finally got some new rules around forestry slash that might actually make a difference to places like Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay, which have been absolutely pounded by logs in Cyclone Gabrielle.

The rules are kicking in very soon- just 4 weeks’ time. And they will require forestry owners to remove their slash if it’s over a certain size, and it’s not particularly large.

Kerre Woodham: Is there still a place for forestry in New Zealand?

We’ll start this morning with the Government’s inquiry into slash, and the damning recommendations that found that production forestry should be banned in extreme erosion zones around Wairoa and Gisborne. Limits should be introduced around how much of a forest can be felled in a single year. And when it's spelled out like that, why would you need an inquiry to tell you? It just makes common sense, doesn't it? Production forestry should be banned in extreme erosion zones.

Well, yeah.

And limits should be introduced around how much of a forest can be felled in a single year. Again, even those of us without any experience in forestry would say, well, yeah, that makes common sense.

Clive Bibby: The inquiry that failed to get to the truth

I have never reacted to a Government sponsored inquiry (the Parata led review of land use in the Tairawhiti and Hawkes Bay regions) with as much shear disappointment as l do having watched the TV reports and the published comments from those who will most likely oversee the recommendations for changes that are necessary to avoid a repeat performance.

 In some ways, l am a reluctant responder to a “review” (note the different label which is a more accurate description of the one former Forestry Minister Nash obviously wanted) that had all the information it needed, including that gleaned from important “ground zero“ submissions ie. those whose farms were partially destroyed during the cyclone.

Point of Order: Govt will spend $400m on schools and classrooms......

........but Hipkins and Tinetti should be bothered by the quality of the curriculum, too

It looks like there were a couple of stragglers, when ministers of the Crown were mustered to unleash a bundle of pre-Budget press statements under an embargo that was lifted at 10.30am yesterday.

Later in the day, another press release related to the clean-up of damage done by Cyclone Gabrielle was released. It came from Forestry Minister Peeni Henare, who announced $10.15 million from Budget 2023 would be appropriated to clean up of slash and debris in Tairāwhiti and Hawke’s Bay and for slash management traps to contain debris from entering waterways in the first place.

Point of Order: Maori haven’t been given half of the 3.5GHz spectrum allocated today......

.......but a 30 per cent share doesn’t seem too paltry

Spark today announced it has signed an agreement with the Crown for a direct allocation of C-band mobile spectrum under a new model where the revenue is directly invested into accelerated mobile network upgrades that benefit provincial and rural New Zealand.

Spark will invest an additional $24 million in funding to the Rural Connectivity Group between 2023 and 2025, which will support the expansion of mobile coverage further into rural New Zealand and address mobile black spots on state highways.