Conservation Comment: Track funding jars with budget

PEST: The plan to free New Zealand of predators such as this stoat is a very big ask. PHOTO/FILE

SHOULDN'T WE be looking at how top rotect our under-pressure pristine landscapes?
Do we need another Great Walk? Regardless of your answer, we're getting one.

The route and huts for the Pike29 Memorial Great Walk in Paparoa National Park in memory of the men who died in the Pike River Mine disaster have been finalised and track construction is due to get under way late this year, with the 65km track opening in late 2018.

Environment Minister Nick Smith says the $10 million project will be the largest new investment in a track since the Conservation Department was created in 1987.

I've nothing against new tracks, but it seems ironic that the Government can find such big money for this track in a political gesture while it is much more parsimonious with the department's overall budget. It's also a bone of contention for many trampers that they can't use their annual passes on Great Walks.

Meanwhile, a new infrastructure report from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment is warning that the avalanche of foreign tourists is beginning to have an impact on visitors' experience and on some of the national parks.

Last year more than a third of foreign tourists visited one of our 13 national parks, with visits to the Fiordland, Mt Aspiring, Mt Cook and Paparoa parks jumping by more than 20 per cent.

The report noted that some iconic locations such as the Tongariro Alpine Crossing and Milford Sound are already showing signs of ill effects from increasing numbers of visitors.

Is another Great Walk the solution? Shouldn't we be looking at how to protect our under-pressure pristine landscapes before they are spoiled by success?

Conservation Minister Maggie Barry certainly didn't understate the enormity of the task when she said achieving the goal of a Predator Free New Zealand by 2050 would require a massive team effort.

The Government has adopted the Predator Free New Zealand 2050 target and plans to set up a new public-private partnership company by the beginning of next year to help fund regional large-scale predator eradication programmes.

The year 2050 is a long way off, but four goals set for 2025 should be a measure on progress. They are:

� An additional 1 million hectares of land where pests have been suppressed or removed through Predator Free New Zealand partnerships

� Development of a scientific breakthrough capable of removing at least one small mammalian predator from New Zealand entirely.

� Demonstrate areas of more than 20,000ha can be predator-free without the use of fences

� Complete removal of all introduced predators from offshore island nature reserves

As Ms Barry says, these are ambitious targets in themselves, but ones that we are capable of reaching if we work together. A predator-free New Zealand is a huge ask but we have to believe it is doable and have the commitment and funding to build on past conservation efforts. Making our landscape a safe haven again for our native species will be worth every dollar.

Let me end by doffing my hat to some eco-heroes.

Over 17 years Geoff Potts' business has supplied some 150,000 plants and trees to the Taranaki Regional Council. As well, he has been very generous with donations of plants and trees to such local projects as the Westmere Lake and Castlecliff Beach enhancement programmes.

My second eco-hero is a man I met on the walkway between Kowhai Park and the City Bridge. When we looked over the riverbank we saw a plastic bag of household rubbish on the water's edge. This man (I don't know his name), was pushing a child in a wheelchair. But that didn't stop him clambering down and fishing out the rubbish and later removing it.

Then there's the Ex-NZFS Deer Culler group, which is restoring old huts in the Tararua, the latest being Arete Forks Hut which has been returned to the original S70 NZFS six-bunk hut design. Reinstating an open fireplace there required a change of thinking, but visitors will enjoy cooking on and sitting in front of open fireplaces. Mid-Waiohine is the only other hut of this type in the Tararua that remains the original design.

�Dave Scoullar is a tramper, conservationist and member of the Te Araroa Whanganui Trust