North wetlands 'declining fast'

DISAPPEARING: NorthTec student Nina Pivac looking for the rare black mudfish in the Hikurangi Swamp earlier this year.

Last week's briefing of the Northland Regional Council's Te Tai Tokerau Mori Advisory Committee on the issue of swamp kauri extraction by a regional council manager would have been very different if Environment Minister Nick Smith had given councils proper policy direction and guidance on protecting indigenous biodiversity according to Green MP Eugenie Age.

"Less than 10 per cent of New Zealand's wetlands remain, and Northland's remaining wetlands are declining fast, with swamp kauri mining being a significant cause," she said.

"The Northland Regional Council's weak regional water and soil plan has so many loopholes that kauri miners can destroy wetlands as a permitted activity, with no need for a resource consent and with no council oversight."

The Resource Management Act required the protection and preservation of wetlands and their natural character as a matter of national importance, but the current government's "inaction and failure to provide councils with clear leadership on protecting biodiversity on private land" was allowing wetland devastation to continue apace.

"Public consultation on a proposed national policy statement on indigenous biodiversity concluded over four years ago, in May 2011," Ms Sage added.

"There has been no progress since then on bringing this vital national policy statement into force. It is currently 'on hold.'

"A national policy statement would provide clear direction to local authorities on their responsibilities for identifying and managing indigenous biodiversity outside the public conservation estate, and if the government had not sat on its hands, and the national policy statement on indigenous biodiversity was in force now, the Northland Regional Council would have been required to tighten its plan rules.

"The council's weak planning and enforcement regime currently provides little control over swamp kauri mining, contributing to the on-going destruction of Northland wetlands," she said.

"The government should be using the RMA to help halt the decline in our indigenous plants and wildlife and ecosystems, not standing by while wetlands are dug up."