Te Arawa Settlement Underlines Shambles In Forestry Policy

The extra $85 million cost to the taxpayer of the Te Arawa settlement, to protect the value of the iwi’s forestry assets against idiotic Government policies such as the proposed $13,000 per hectare retrospective deforestation tax, underlines the shambles in climate change and forestry policy, the Kyoto Forestry Association (KFA) said today.

“The extra $85 million transfer was necessary given that the Government’s policies are destroying the value of forestry, fuelling record deforestation and encouraging conversion to dairying,” KFA spokesman Roger Dickie said today.

“The Government has confiscated $1.25 billion of carbon credits from post-1990 forest owners and is threatening massive new taxes on pre-1990 forests.

“If the Government persists with such idiocy, all forest owners will need to be compensated in the way that Te Arawa has been, in order to maintain any significant exotic forest cover in New Zealand.”

Mr Dickie said KFA supported Maori aspirations in forestry, including the Federation of Maori Authorities’ contemporary claim to the Waitangi Tribunal seeking a reversal of the Government’s 2002 confiscation of Kyoto carbon credits.

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