By Rose Davis, r.davis@forestandbird.org.nz A dolphin gazes straight into my eyes and it’s like getting a rare glimpse of pure love. I’m under the sea wearing a mask and snorkel, turning in circles as a pod of about eight huge, gentle bottlenose dolphins swims around me in a Waiheke Island bay. I squeal in excitement […]
Forest & Bird, New Zealand’s largest independent conservation organisation, moved its bank accounts from ANZ because of serious concerns over the bank’s investments in fossil fuels. Forest & Bird asked ANZ for a fossil fuel divestment plan in 2016, but hasn’t been satisfied with the company’s response. In March 2018, Forest & Bird announced its […]
The state of our environment, especially freshwater is of great concern to a wide cross section of people in New Zealand. The recently developed Freshwater Rescue Plan, supported by 16 organisations, from the public health sector to tourism and conservation, includes seven steps on how to save New Zealand’s waterways. One of the aims is […]
The 67 hectare Te Rere Reserve was purchased by Forest & Bird in 1989 when native forest logging was threatening the yellow-eyed penguin population. The site is managed by the Southland Branch with dedicated volunteers planting up to 1000 locally sourced native species every year, fencing, track making, carrying out weed and animal pest control, […]
Recently, I got the chance to head down to the Denniston plateau – a piece of land that is currently being eyed up by coal-miners – to marvel at the ‘Persian carpet of biodiversity’ that the famed photographer Rod Morris talks so fondly about. I’ve been a macro-photographer for four years now, and as you […]
Until a week ago, Solid Energy appeared to be the one of the prize jewels in the portfolio of state assets that the Government intended to sell. Now the company seems set to become a huge, slowly-dying albatross around taxpayer’s necks. Here at Forest & Bird we don’t like the idea of dying albatross, metaphoric […]
Between an ineffective Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and the removal of the ability to consider the negative effects of climate change in resource consent applications, New Zealand continues to lack any instrument to address climate change. Rather than looking to clean-green sources of energy, there’s a mad scramble to extract diminishing supplies of fossil fuels […]
Energy and Resources Minister Phil Heatley ‘met the press’ on The Nation on Saturday, the day after former Energy Minister and opposition spokesperson David Parker had offered some comments in the New Zealand Herald. I want to respond briefly to Mr Heatley’s comments, and explore Labour’s, because Heatley got an absurdly easy ride on The […]
Who thinks China is a threat? Three lonely hands wave in a packed Massey University lecture theatre. Who thinks China is an opportunity? Jonathan Watts asks. This time, over half of the 140-strong audience raise their hands. Watts, the Guardian’s Asia environment correspondent, believes China is both. His April tour around the country followed the […]