Maggie Barry: Predator free Northland in the long view

Minister of Conservation Maggie Barry, with National's Northland candidate Matt King, background, and Aroha Island Ecological Centre manager Simon Martin.

As she outlined the Government's stepped-up Predator Free 2050 plans to Northland conservation groups and officials, the Minister of Conservation gleefully admitted how much she loved killing possums.

"I am the Cabinet's biggest killer. I say that with pride," Maggie Barry said about the number of death warrants she has signed in the fight to rid New Zealand of rodents, stoats and possums.

Ms Barry was at Aroha Island Ecological Centre, near Kerikeri, on Saturday to talk with local groups about how Predator Free 2050 (PF2050) will work in Northland, through a range of community, corporate and government partnerships.

The Ministry of Conservation has funded the region an extra $300,000 in the 2017/18 year and providing grants up to $10,000 for developing local Predator Free 2050 strategies, she said.

The ministry set the goal date of 2050 then had to figure out how to do it, Ms Barry said.
"Predator Free 2050 is now so entrenched it would be very hard for any government to move away from that."

In the past, scientific breakthroughs included improvements in and safer applications of 1080, leading to wide acceptance of its use in areas where ground trapping was not practical, Ms Barry said.

"But 2050, for me, is about being a toxic free environment as well."

Science could also come to the PF2050 party with biological warfare using gene-mapping, "But we don't have the social licence for that".

Among commitments to the 2050 target, the Department of Conservation (DoC) had employed nine rangers to identify regional needs, help set up "trap libraries" and other shared community resources, and liaise with iwi, community groups and agencies.

The Northland Predator Free ranger is Fleur Corbett who spoke about work already being done in Northland, much of it through alliances between community groups.

"As a region we can be hugely proud of all this work. If we can get even more people involved we'll be well within range of being predator free by 2050," Ms Corbett said.

Ms Barry also spoke about other threats to biodiversity such as kauri dieback and myrtle rust.

On the gains side, there was more than a 1000 per cent increase in the number of kokako in the Waipoua and Donnellys Crossing forests on the Kauri Coast, she said.

Ms Barry outlined the role of Predator Free 2050 Ltd (PF2050 Ltd), an "independent Crown company", set up last year to direct investment into regionally significant eradication projects.

PF2050 Ltd will receive $6 million per year of new government funding to invest in those projects and also in break-through science.

Ms Barry said in return it is expected to leverage contributions from business, local government and philanthropists of approximately $10m per year.

While Ms Barry may have preaching to the converted at the Northland roll-out of more information, some conservation groups say the PF2050 associated funding is too little.

Northland Forest and Bird advocate Dean Baigent-Mercer refused to attend the PF2050 announcements.

He said Forest and Bird had highlighted "ongoing crises" such as the collapsing Russell State Forest in 2015.

"We pointed out clearly that Northland DoC alone needs an extra $10-$20m to turn around the collapse over the next decade," Mr Baigent-Mercer said.

"I am not going to praise a Minister for crumbs when DoC is actually doing so little and the community and hapu are carrying the greatest extent of the work in Northland."