Tagged: Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment

NZ tourism can use the disruption of COVID-19 to drive sustainable change — and be more competitive - News

Guest Author • Feb 18, 2021 •

• climate change,
• depature tax,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment,
• tourism

James Higham, University of Otago The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’s second tourism report urges the government to take advantage of the disruption caused by COVID-19 to transform the tourism industry. Titled “Not 100% – but four steps closer to sustainable tourism”, it builds on commissoner Simon Upton’s 2019 “Pristine, popular … imperilled?” report and presents four detailed … Read More

Farms, forests, and fossil fuels - Planetary Ecology

Robert McLachlan • Mar 28, 2019 •

• climate change,
• greenhouse gas emissions,
• James Shaw,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment,
• Simon Upton

That’s the title of the new report from Simon Upton, Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. In a pattern we’ve become used to, James Shaw, Minister for Climate Change, immediately released a statement to say that the report’s main recommendation – that forests not be allowed to offset fossil emissions – was not on the table. But the same day … Read More

The Lark Descending: are non-native birds undervalued in New Zealand? - Guest Work

Guest Author • Jun 23, 2017 •

• birds Garden Bird Survey,
• blackbird,
• chaffinch,
• dunnock,
• extinction,
• goldfinch,
• non-native,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment,
• red list,
• song thrush,
• tarling

By Stephen D Wratten, Lincoln University, New Zealand New Zealand has an audacious plan to protect its native birds. The country has pledged to rid itself of introduced mammalian predators by 2050 and, this year, will spend $20 million on the Battle for the Birds, one of the largest predator control programmes in the country’s history, across … Read More

For the birds – reflections on the PCE report - The Dismal Science

Eric Crampton • Jun 08, 2017 •

• birds,
• conservation,
• farming,
• genetic engineering,
• genetic modification,
• native,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment,
• predator control

There’s an important recommendation missing from the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’s list of things to help endangered birds. It hardly would work for all birds, but it is ridiculous that it is banned for those birds for which it would work. Let people farm them. Roger Beattie has demonstrated that he can successfully raise weka. There would be … Read More

New homes for our native birds? - Guest Work

Guest Author • May 31, 2017 •

• birds,
• conservation,
• IUCN,
• native species,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment,
• PCE,
• urban habitats

By Prof Phil Seddon, University of Otago. The newly released report from the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (Taonga of an island nation) highlights the precarious state of our native avifauna, with one in five of our 168 native bird species at risk of extinction. Birds are highly visible but also highly vulnerable indicators of habitat change, not just … Read More

No silver bullet for agricultural emissions, says Environment Commissioner - News

John Kerr • Oct 19, 2016 •

• agricultural emissions,
• agriculture,
• emissions,
• ETS,
• greenhouse gases,
• methane,
• nitrous oxide,
• Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment

New Zealanders need to work together to tackle the “complex problem of the biological greenhouse gases from agriculture,” warns the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment in a new report.  The report Climate change and agriculture: Understanding the biological greenhouse gases, released today, aims to tease out various issues in the fraught area of biological emissions and signpost solutions. “In a way, my report … Read More