Zoo joins fight against mining

London Zoo is joining the campaign against allowing mining on New Zealand's conservation estate, in a bid to save a rare, endangered frog.

The Zoological Society of London is calling on the British public to make submissions on the New Zealand Government's proposals to permit mining on more than 7000 hectares of the conservation estate, the Dominion Post reported.

The campaign was launched on the London Zoo website and is drawing attention to the plight of the critically endangered Archey's frog, found in the area of the Coromandel Peninsula proposed as suitable for mining.

The frog is described as the "most evolutionarily distinct and globally endangered amphibian on the planet."

Conservation project coordinator Helen Meredith said Archey's frogs were like living fossils - almost indistinguishable from 150 million-year-old fossilised remains.

New Zealand was considering removing protections from land where rare and endangered species lived, despite it being the United Nations Year of Biodiversity, she said.

"In the year when reducing biodiversity loss is high on the political agenda, it is inconceivable to think that we'd put the nail in the coffin of some of our rarest and most extraordinary frog species."

Submissions on the Government's discussion paper about mining on the conservation estate close at 5pm on Wednesday.

- NZPA