Winter is upon us, which means that tree planting season is too. Apart from being quite huggable, trees are one of our best bets at mitigating climate change and our native wildlife depends on them for shelter and food. This week on the Green Desk Frances Wright caught up with Robyn Haugh, the CEO of Trees That Count, a native tree planting initiative that works through a gifting and planting system. They spoke about how Trees That Count came to be, and what it’s doing for our planet and Aotearoa's biodiversity. Whakarongo mai!
The Waitematā Harbour is an intertidal ecosystem inhabited by clams, cockles, crabs, algae, and microscopic worms.
In a recent University of Auckland study on the effects of microplastics in the Waitematā Harbor PhD Candidate Sam Ladewig found that plastic pollution is fundamentally altering the natural cycles of life in the harbour's waters.
The investigation found that microplastic pollution is altering the flow of oxygen through the systems, and the long-term effects of this are currently unknown.
This week on The Green Desk, Troy spoke to Ladewig about the study and the harms of plastic pollution on New Zealand’s oceans.
Sometimes you can't see the forest from the trees but spare a thought for the wilderness beneath the waves. Kelp forests are found in shallow ocean waters off a third of the world's coastlines, and, according to new research are worth hundreds of billions of dollars to society.
Marine ecologist Dr Aaron Eger led the study and is also the founder and director of the Kelp Forest Alliance – a research-driven not-for-profit dedicated to accelerating the protection and restoration of kelp forests worldwide. Today he's on The Green Desk to discuss his work putting a dollar value to the kelp forests below the sea level.
This week on The Green Desk things get shitty — New Zealand has a poo problem: An estimated 100 million tonnes of cow and sheep manure fall onto New Zealand pastures each year, causing an environmental and economic stink.
Reporter Jack Marshall went to see a man about a dung beetle. Dung Beetle Innovations’s Dr. Shaun Forgie is a specialist in dung beetle reproduction, ecology and evolution. And if he has his way, every farm in New Zealand will have these bugs following around their animals.
Sherry speaks to Green Party co-leader James Shaw on the Landfill Levy increase. This will rise from $10 per tonne to $50/$60 by 2023. We also speak about the suicide prevention office, recently set up by the goverment to deal with New Zealand’s concerning high rates of suicide.
Sherry begins by asking him why New Zealand has one of the high rates per capita in the developed world of waste production.
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Bronwyn speaks to Kevin Moran from Save Our Springs about Te Waikoropupū Springs which are currently the subject of a Water Conservation Order being challenged in the Environment Court.
Located close to Takaka in Golden Bay, these freshwater springs are the largest in New Zealand and contain some of the clearest water found in the world. The iconic blue-tinted waters are recognised as a wāhi tapu by the Māori Heritage Council and are of great cultural and spiritual significance to local iwi Ngāti Tama, Te Ātiawa and Ngāti Rarua.
In 2017, Ngāti Tama and Andrew Yuill applied for a Water Conservation Order, however the special tribunal's recommendatory report was not published until the 17th of March this year. In response, ten parties have lodged further proceedings in the Environment Court, some believing the tribunal's report was too strict and others, not restrictive enough.
Save Our Springs is among those appearing in court later this year, calling for improvements to the draft order.
This election Dr Elizabeth Kerekere has entered parliament as one of the Green Party’s 10 MP’s. Dr Kerekere is a Maori, LGBTQ+ activist and scholar and she speaks to Jemima Huston about what she will bring to parliament, the goals she has this term and her thoughts on the Labour / Greens Cooperation Agreement.
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