Beyond DOC job cuts: ‘The worst is yet to come’

[Michael Szabo]

The Department of Conservation faces a triple whammy – losing staff, losing budget, and enduring a time of increasing costs.
“The worst is yet to come,” predicts Gary Taylor of the Environmental Defence Society. “There’s going to be more, and more serious and far-reaching, disruption coming for DOC over the next little while.”
Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones (of NZ First) has talked about selling conservation stewardship land - that's land transferred to DOC in 1987 but which hasn’t been fully assessed for conservation values.
How much stewardship land might go? “Probably all of it,” Gary Taylor says.

Link to full article: https://newsroom.co.nz/2024/04/16/beyon ... GGZ2zR8GmN

[Richard_Jones]

Hi Michael/All.
Thanks for bringing yet further serious news to our attention. It just gets worse and worse. Notwithstanding, does anyone know (i) how much land falls within the 'conservation stewardship land' umbrella? and (ii) why has this land not been fully assessed for conservation values after having been transferred to DOC 37 years ago?
Regards,
Richard

[Jim_j]

There was a big review underway of stewardship land just last year - I think it got as far as the recommendation stage - I imagine the election killed it.

Cheers jim

[Michael Szabo]

One third of all the conservation land is currently classed as stewardship land. That's about 2.7 million hectares of conservation land, or around 9 percent of New Zealand:
https://www.forestandbird.org.nz/campai ... gIL0vD_BwE