Question No. 8—Environment 8. Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Green)(remote) to the Minister for the Environment: Talofa, Mr Speaker. Thank you. Is dilution the solution to agricultural nitrate pollution, or is there a need to reduce nitrate leaching into groundwater in regions such as Canterbury to reduce risks to drinking water and freshwater from farmed areas? Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister... Continue Reading →
I hope that the policymakers involved in the current revamp of environmental policy remember the words of Winston Churchill: ‘Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.’
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We are the problem. My earthday talk for 350.org.nz and Fridays for Future
Its earth day today April 22nd but more importantly just three days three days ago was New Zealand’s ecological overshoot day! So, starting from January 1 until April 19 2022 we lived within our planetary life supporting system means, but that ended last Tuesday. Now every day until the end of the year we go... Continue Reading →
A new report revealing yet another central and local government freshwater protection failure : ‘No Bridge Over Troubled Water; Transmission Gully, Te Puka Stream’
by Sarah Monod de Froideville and Charles Louisson, Victoria University Wellington https://www.newsroom.co.nz/peering-into-transmission-gullys-environmental-blind-spot Background of my involvement: A few years ago, I was contracted by Kapiti Coast District Council (KCDC) to be their freshwater ecologist for the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) Board of Inquiry (BOI) into the Transmission Gully project. KCDC wasn’t opposing they just wanted... Continue Reading →
The Groundswell protest claimed regulation and taxes are unfair to farmers – the economic numbers tell a different story
While the sector pays tax on income like everyone else, the amount paid by the dairy sector ($531.7 million in 2019/20 – or 0.7% of total tax revenue) looks to be substantially less than the costs associated with transfers from the government back to the sector and remediation of environmental damage caused by the sector.... Continue Reading →
The future of food and energy
My webinar with Nelson Tasman Climate Forum, the first hour or so is talk the rest is Q&A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iburYeY0Rnc
Summer Science, there’s something in our water
Dr Mike Joy is a freshwater ecologist at Victoria University of Wellington. As a scientist he works in the field, studying freshwater organisms and the complex relationships they have with the aquatic environment. As a science communicator however, Mike has become an active participant in one of New Zealand most controversial issues; the nitrate pollution... Continue Reading →
The bottled water industry gets our best water for free and sell it back to us, while we get the second rate stuff through our taps
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1753-6405.13196 Having spent what feels like half of my life trying to highlight the decline of freshwater in New Zealand and the causes it is infuriating beyond description to realise that through this work I am playing into the hands of the mostly transnational water bottling companies operating in New Zealand. I have been part... Continue Reading →
Freshwater for life 