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“Politicians and lobbyists wrong to question national biodiversity crisis” says NZ Ecological Society

The NZ Ecological Society at its annual conference at Lincoln University this week confirmed Dr Mike Joy’s assessment of the state of New Zealand’s environment.

While the landscape may look green, the state of New Zealand’s environment is in anything but a good state. And the countries indigenous biodiversity is in a critical state. Practically all indicators show that New Zealand’s environment is in a steady state of decline as a result of human modification, the impact of invasive species and environmental change such as climate change. The condition of the majority of New Zealand’s waterways has deteriorated, the number of threatened native species continues to rise and the ecological condition of a large proportion of New Zealand’s forests, dunes and wetlands is known to be deteriorating.

“Politicians are entitled to their opinion but the evidence is compelling about the state of New Zealand’s environment” says Mel Galbraith, NZES President. “New Zealand’s ecological scientists provide the research to describe and explain what is occurring in New Zealand’s ecosystems and waterways” he says.

What they have discovered, and presented at this weeks national ecological conference at Lincoln University, highlights major problems ahead for the New Zealand environment especially indigenous ecosystems.

“We know that most New Zealanders regard their environment as a precious resource. We also know that “Mum and Dad investors” and many farmers want their natural environment to be protected because our economy is so intrinsically linked to the environment,” says Galbraith.

“It is sad that the government is choosing to attack individuals, such as Dr Mike Joy, rather than listening to what is being said about the ecological problems facing New Zealand and providing sufficient resources to remedy the situation.” Maintaining a robust state of the environment reporting methodology will go some way to ensuring accurate information is available about changes in the NZ environment.

The NZ Ecological Society is the country’s largest non-governmental organisation devoted to ecological research in New Zealand and is holding it s national conference this week in Lincoln

ENDS

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Arguably Reassuring: Inspector-General Finds GCSB "Arguably" Legal

Of the 88 individuals:

• 15 cases involving 22 individuals did not have any information intercepted by GCSB.

• another four cases involving five individuals were the subjects of a New Zealand Security Intelligence Service warrant and the GCSB assisted in the execution of the warrants. The Inspector-General is of the view that there were arguably no breaches and the law is unclear.

• the Bureau only provided technical assistance which did not involve interception of communications, involving three of the individuals, so no breach occurred.

• the remaining cases involved the collection of metadata, and the Inspector-General formed the view that there had arguably been no breach, noting once again that the law is unclear.
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