Ministry for the Environment | Manatū mō te Taiao

#CONSULTATION - Have your say on how Aotearoa New Zealand should adapt to a changing climate. 🗣 Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee has called for public submissions to its inquiry into climate adaptation. Adaptation means strengthening our ability to cope with risks from natural events, like storms, floods and landslips. 🌌 The cross-party inquiry is working on recommendations for the principles and objectives of an adaptation framework. This framework is being developed to help New Zealand prepare for the impacts of climate change, and provide clarity on costs. Find out more and have your say by Sunday, 16 June here: https://lnkd.in/gdatJpSg You can read more about work to develop the framework here: https://lnkd.in/ghJDzNWB

He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission are inviting rangatahi for a kōrero about their climate change consultation. They are keen to hear your feedback and answer your questions.

Early bird tickets are now available to the Sustainable Business Network upcoming two-day Nature and Business Symposium. 📆 Tuesday 13 Aug 2024 - Wednesday 14 Aug 2024 🕐9am to 5pm 📍AUT University, Sir Paul Reeves/WG Building, 2 Governor Fitzroy Place, Auckland Find out more and get your tickets here: Nature and Business Symposium - SBN (sustainable.org.nz)

Bay of Plenty based Project Parore was named the Established Catchment Champion at the Cawthron Institute’s Freshwater Champions awards this week. The project is partly funded by Ministry for the Environment through the Freshwater Improvement Fund and is focused on improving water quality, ecosystem health, sustainable land use and biodiversity of the streams and receiving waters of the northern Tauranga Harbour. From small beginnings in 2004 it’s now creating Catchment Development Plans for eight catchments in the hills around the estuary, works with landowners and councils, employs and trains local people in restoration planting, pest control and much more. Learn more: https://projectparore.nz/

How does the NZ Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) work ❓ The NZ ETS is the key tool to reduce emissions. Watch to find out how New Zealand Units are bought and sold in the scheme. ⬆ #CONSULTATION is now open on the Government’s annual review of the NZ ETS auction settings. Auction settings are reviewed every year to ensure the NZ ETS is working as well as it can to support our climate targets. Consultation provides an opportunity for members of the public to have their say on proposals to update unit limits and price control settings for the NZ ETS. Find out more and have your say here: https://lnkd.in/gQ4vm-Ft

The Aotearoa Circle and Chapman Tripp have today released a report which we believe is essential reading for any New Zealand exporter or business in the export supply chain. The report Protecting New Zealand’s Competitive Advantage reveals the pressure on New Zealand businesses to keep up with international expectations on sustainability reporting. It shows more than 80% of New Zealand’s exports by value are now going to countries with mandatory climate-related disclosures either in force or proposed. This report is intended to help businesses in Aotearoa understand what they will need to do in terms of their ESG reporting to secure market access into the future. We hope this snapshot of global expectations will help government and business alike to be prepared, in a rapidly changing world of new climate and sustainability reporting requirements and emerging trade measures that relate to climate change and sustainability. If you are an exporter or part of the ecosystem that supports our exporters, we hope this report will be useful for you. You can find the report here. https://lnkd.in/gGnCtazx We want to thank the authors, Chapman Tripp partners Nicola Swan and Alana Lampitt and their Director – Climate, Sustainability & ESG Kate Wilson Butler, plus the wider team at Chapman Tripp for their incredible work on this report. 

The New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) is the key tool in the government’s climate change response to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It supports Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its emissions reduction goals by putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions. Businesses must provide a New Zealand Unit (NZU) for every tonne of climate pollution they emit. These units can be purchased through Government auctions held four times per year or be traded through the secondary market. Auction settings such as the reserve price are reviewed every year to ensure the NZ ETS is working as well as it can to support climate targets. https://lnkd.in/djMB7wXD

Consultation is now open on the Government’s annual review of the New Zealand Emission Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) auction settings. Auction settings are reviewed every year to ensure the NZ ETS is working as well as it can to support our climate targets. What actually are auction settings? - Price control settings, for example, the reserve price. - The limit on the total number of NZ units – each representing one metric tonne of carbon dioxide – available for auction For the NZ ETS to support emissions reductions, the number of NZ units available needs to go down in line with the limits on emissions that New Zealand has set. Consultation provides an opportunity for members of the public to have their say on proposals to update unit limits and price control settings for the NZ ETS. Find out more and have your say here: https://lnkd.in/gtcTv--w

How can we improve the health of our estuaries❔ The Ministry for the Environment and Sustainable Seas National Science Challenge have partnered up to investigate, based on three case studies. One of those is Kakanui Estuary in Otago where we worked with the community to understand the available information and data, concerns about estuary health and community values and aspirations for their estuary. The community was keen to understand the causes of degradation and possible mitigations. Kakanui Estuary is small with limited environmental monitoring conducted. So, this was an opportunity to test the toolkit developed by Sustainable Seas on an estuary with less data. Heavy rain at the start of January 2021 caused flooding in several rivers, including Kakanui. This scoured the estuary and removed all macroalgae before the most recent survey, but previous studies found estuary degradation due to increased algae growth. You're invited to discuss the Kakanui Estuary case study. Join us to hear about the project and some of the ways communities can monitor and improve estuary health. We hope this project will provide practical assistance to councils navigating estuaries, identify similarities across different estuarine ecosystems and see if there are any gaps in our current systems. Upcoming Community Hui: Tools for Kakanui Estuary 📆 23 May 2024 ⏰ 5:30pm – 7:30pm 📍 At Kakanui School (1/3 Fyfe Place, Kakanui 9495) If you can’t make it to the in-person hui, you can learn more about caring for Estuaries here: https://lnkd.in/gnwvQEWv [Image description] a photo, taken from above, of an estuary off Motukaraka Island, Auckland. To the left there are clusters of trees and to the right the sun is setting over the estuary, giving the sky a gorgeous orange hue.

Work is underway to develop an adaptation framework to strengthen Aotearoa New Zealand’s ability to cope with the effects of climate change. The framework is intended to deliver a fair and enduring system to help the country be ready for climate change, and provide clarity on costs. ☔ Work to develop the framework is expected to focus on: ▪️ Making sure people know what investment in infrastructure, such as flood protection measures, will happen in their area. ▪️ Setting out the Government’s approach to sharing the costs of adaptation, and what support will be available for property owners. ▪️ Clarifying roles and responsibilities. ▪️ Improving access to information, so individuals and organisations can make informed decisions about management of risk. The Minister of Climate Change has also announced that Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee is conducting an inquiry to provide recommendations to feed into the adaptation framework. The committee is made up of MPs from across political parties, allowing for cross-party consultation to build an enduring framework and tackle the financial issues around adaptation. Submissions made to the Environment Committee’s previous inquiry into climate adaptation will be considered, and the Finance and Expenditure Committee is also likely to call for new and additional public submissions - details will be made available on Parliament’s website. 🔗 https://lnkd.in/gRGQQJpr