New Zealand’s commitment to the flawed Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) is causing environmental, economic and social damage as foreign companies buy up productive farmland to plant pine forests.
The Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa (CAFCA) says the sale of farmland to overseas interests who aim to convert it to forestry is by far the most common type of consent that the Overseas Investment Office issues.
CAFCA Secretary Murray Horton says foreign companies are eager to convert hill country farms to forests it in order to make a quick buck by selling carbon credits to polluters under the ETS.
“Flogging off Aotearoa’s New Zealand’s forestry rights goes back to the 1980s, when the Rogernomics Labour government sold cutting rights to overseas companies. It was only the Treaty of Waitangi that stopped them from selling the Crown land that the forests grew on,” Horton says.
“Since the creation of the ETS in 2008, however, the Government has approved the sale of a huge amount of private agricultural land to overseas companies – much of it sheep and beef farms in eastern regions of the North Island”.
“Stuff journalist Marty Sharpe has done a deep dive into the Overseas Investment Office’s records, and he says over the past ten years more than 95,000 hectares of land has been approved to be sold to overseas companies for $781 million”.
“The two biggest buyers are connected with Ikea, so large corporations are getting in on the act.”
Critics say the practice of covering hillsides in fast-growing, shallow rooted pinus radiata trees creates a number of problems for both rural communities and the environment. It takes jobs out of local economies and stifles biodiversity, which threatens native species.
Sharpe’s Stuff article quotes Federated Farmers spokesperson Toby Williams, who says forestry does provide some jobs when the trees are planted and much later, when they are harvested. But it does not provide as many jobs as farming.
Williams says, while planting trees on the steepest, most unproductive land can make good sense financially and environmentally, converting whole farms to pines does not. It only adds up economically because of the ETS subsidies, which foreign companies are treating as a “cash cow”.
Along with its economic drawbacks, the whole framework of offsetting emissions by purchasing carbon credits does not address the root cause of climate change, Horton says.
“Manufacturers, airlines and other businesses can offset carbon dioxide emissions by purchasing carbon credits, which allows them to escape sanctions and carry on polluting,” he says.
“Because of this the European Union now says companies that rely on carbon offsetting cannot claim to be carbon zero.”
Horton says, for this reason Commissioner for the Environment Simon Upton wants to phase out the ETS scheme. According to Upton, forests would have to remain unharvested virtually forever to offset carbon dioxide emissions.
“This is clearly not possible, since trees have a natural lifespan, not to mention the growing threats of fire, flooding and disease caused by climate change,” Horton says.
“Ask people in Tairawhiti and Hawkes Bay about the downstream effects of planting vast areas of hill country in pine plantations. Slash and logs from clear-fell harvesting devastated farms and beaches and cost lives when cyclones caused floods there in 2023″.
“Radiata pine trees are also very flammable which can have disastrous consequences. The people of Christchurch have watched the Port Hills catch fire and burn two times in recent years largely because some of the hillsides are planted in pines.” Wilding pines create a whole other set of problems.
In summary the sale of farmland to overseas interests to plant monoculture pine plantations can create a perfect storm that is bad for the economy, bad for the environment and bad for people.
Murray Horton
CAFCA Secretary
The biggest thing being over looked is the willingness of farmers to sell for way too much and the fact that a lot of these farms are no longer profitable so if an agent comes along with a few million that agent is chained to the nearest fence till the deal is done and dusted .Also remember the government loves foreign money .They also love selling wood for bugger all .
Apart from anything else the planting of poxy pine trees is the crime, how about a mix of natives and exotics. Real wood such as Macrocarpa is great for building, doesn’t need treating and can be milled depending on requirement at various stages between 15 to 40 years.
Kudos for publishing this Martyn.
Pine trees are an environmental nightmare and the death of small town New Zealand.
Reducing carbon footprint can be done in much better ways – rewild with natives for a start.
“Stuff journalist Marty Sharpe has done a deep dive into the Overseas Investment Office’s records, and he says over the past ten years more than 95,000 hectares of land has been approved to be sold to overseas companies for $781 million”.
“The two biggest buyers are connected with Ikea, so large corporations are getting in on the act.”
Critics say the practice of covering hillsides in fast-growing, shallow rooted pinus radiata trees creates a number of problems for both rural communities and the environment. It takes jobs out of local economies and stifles biodiversity, which threatens native species.
Sales on the east coast of NI for forestry might have some rationale if the land is poor. But the trouble is if it is decided to cut and replant there is –
1 Slash left that has caused farm and property and shoreline damage further down and is left to be a mess and pollutant.
2 The land usually lies bare while waiting for the replanting, the right season, the young trees en masse to be available, infrastructure etc. Topsoil is washed away to where it is damaging from where it is needed.
3 The land is unstable apparently on the east coast and the trees should never be cut down now we have entered the age of very unstable weather, shifting cyclone patterns and dumps of rain with atmospheric rivers that can hover for a week or so. Even just cutting the timber high and leaving roots and ground untouched – relatively – is no good for the leaves of fully grown trees would displace the force of much of the rain.
People who know about such things have been talking about this for yonks. But the neo-colonialist gold-rushers, environmental strippers find old-fashioned trees just as magnetic as new wealth-making tech. Never leave a monetary opportunity unturned is their motto.
Straying from trees. More for me, and the others may be called “pedo guy.’ (What Musk called one of the dedicated Thai cave rescuers because, I think, he pointed out that none of Musk’s ideas or machines would answer to help delicate humans through that gruelling challenge.)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50695593
Elon Musk did not defame a British caver who helped in last year’s rescue of trapped Thai schoolboys by calling him a “pedo guy”, a US jury has found.
Vernon Unsworth sought $190m (£145m) in damages from the Tesla founder, arguing that the tweet damaged his reputation…
During an interview with CNN, the diver suggested the billionaire “stick his submarine where it hurts”… [Can’t afford to get irritable with poseurs – it got cleared and classed as a ‘JDart’!]
Mr Musk told the court this week the phrase “pedo guy” was common in South Africa, where he grew up.
Speaking to reporters outside the courtroom after the jury reached its decision, Mr Musk said: “My faith in humanity is restored.” …
Thoughts; why such a big amount? – it may be USA style but perhaps not to other jurisdictions.
If South Africans commonly use such ugly language they may have minds to match.
Musk playing the victim with an angelic visage doesn’t indicate values; his expression risible.
The sort of man above caring honestly about other lowly humans is what we have in buckets now. With some women aiming to beat blokes to the high profits, accolades and times, we are surrounded. Strange attempts at humour provide a laugh and sanity. As Gary Larsson has the isolated USA farmer calling to his wife after viewing
a large hovering thing outside the window, ‘Quick Mama fetch the shotgun. The aliens are at the chickens again.’
“The two biggest buyers are connected with Ikea, so large corporations are getting in on the act.”
Will there be an Ikea factory in Tokoroa? Makes you wonder why NZ with all this pine wood, never built its own huge Ikea-type corporate exporter? A country with no business plan.
AoNZ needs to charge a higher company income tax on commodity exports, logs, pulp, meat carcasses, milk powder, gold, aluminium and a lower tax rate on value-added goods. Commodity exporters are such great companies that they get to proudly pay a premium income tax.
Dont be silly that would mean clawing back all the corporate welfare handed out over the years .Business people are piss weak in NZ and wait around for the government to tell them what to do .Take wool for example .Levies were collected for years to boost the wool board .That was a total waste of money as they achieved nothing after 60 years .Wood is the same we should be exporting structual laminated beams and such like not bulk logs which we then buy back as wood products like furniture .The sale of sheep farms is the result of failed business model for selling bulk wool for next to nothing so now farmers cant afford the cost of shearing the sheep ,and in fact some are just dumping the wool in a gully on the farm .I noted last year an Australian company bought a large mothballed mill in Gisborne where they are investing in plant and will be exporting finished sawn wood product from there as they know there is a massive world market .So the real issue is the need for farmers to sell before they go bankrupt and the banks own a lot of worthless land .Another fail of the market led economy .