Urgent planning for climate change needed for people and wildlife

Forest & Bird is calling for better planning to protect people and wildlife, following a new report on climate change adaptation.

The Adaptation Technical Working Group (CCATWG) released a report today making recommendations on adaptation to climate change, including freshwater management changes.

"We are already beginning to experience the impacts of climate change and our wildlife is too," says Forest & Bird climate advocate Adelia Hallett.

"For example, the more turbulent water around the Haukaki Gulf and Northland over summer made it harder for our kororā (little blue penguins) to hunt, and we saw dead and starving penguins washing up on beaches."

"These kinds of hard years for native species are going to be more and more common. We need to make sure nature is resilient and can survive these changes."

The report recommends the National Policy Statement on Freshwater Management should include the need to respond to likely impacts of climate change (recommendation 21 in the report).

"Climate change will bring more extreme weather, so both droughts and floods will be more frequent in our freshwater systems. We need to include these effects in our planning, and make sure we protect rivers for the fish and birds that rely on them."

"The Government should act now do what the report recommends and develop an adaptation plan for New Zealand," says Ms Hallett.

"But we also need to cut emissions urgently. We'll need to keep warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels if we are to have any chance of retaining a world that’s comfortable for us and for our precious native species."

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