The Labour-NZ First coalition government announced in late 2017 that there would be “no new mines on conservation land.” Since then, more than 150,000 ha of mining permits have been approved on conservation land, according to documents released to Forest and Bird under the OIA. F&B’s review of stewardship areas found they contained 28% of our biodiversity priority sites and more than 3000 parcels of land.

Currently, pro-mining interests and their advocates are trying to block the policies, and to get Stewardship Land, a form of not-yet-classified conservation land, removed from the conservation land fold. This would allow the sacrifice of many precious areas of native ecosystems and habitats to be turned over to the miners.
 
These areas include some of New Zealand’s most spectacular landscapes and contain many of our more than 4,000 threatened plants and animals, including native Archey’s frog-pepeketua in the Coromandel (pictured).

The petition is here.

Photo: Coromandel Watchdog