Proposal to add Crown-owned land into Te Urewera through the Ngāti Ruapani mai Waikaremoana Treaty of Waitangi settlement

The New Zealand Conservation Authority (the Authority) appreciates the opportunity to comment on this proposal to add Crown land into Te Urewera. The Authority discussed the matter at its recent meeting on 18 October. It established a committee to look into the proposal in detail, and they have sought both legal and ecological advice to support their korero.

Land transfer

The Authority understands that the proposal is to add Crown-owned land to Te Urewera through the Ngāti Ruapani settlement legislation. The Authority’s preference is for the process in Te Urewera Act 2014 for adding land to be used. It is appropriate to use the specific process established in relation to Te Urewera, and the process is preferable because it involves a report by the Director-General, which requires a public notice and submission process.

Ecological values

The Authority received information from the Department of Conservation which provides an overview of conservation management information and conservation values of the public conservation land under consideration for transfer. Five of the blocks (Map ID # 1, 2, 4, 16, 17 on the map accompanying your letter) are described as having very high to exceptional botanical conservation values, especially the two blocks with records of native kakabeak (Waikareiti Conservation Area Map ID #16, and Ruakituri Scenic Reserve Map ID #17). The Panekirikiri Conservation Area (Map ID #2) has both exceptional botanical conservation values and an outstanding fauna ranking.

Kakabeak (Clianthus maximus) is listed by the Department of Conservation as Threatened - Nationally Critical which is the highest threat ranking before extinction. There are approximately 108 wild plants in the two blocks of interest:

Waikareiti Conservation Area: Very High-Exceptional Botanical value - contains wild kakabeak plants at Tataramoa Bluffs, approximately 6% of the national wild population

• Ruakituri Scenic Reserve: High botanical value - contains wild kakabeak plants, identified as one of the nationally significant sites (an Ecological Management Unit) where management is required to prevent extinction of the species with approximately 8% of the national wild population.

Kakabeak is very palatable and browsing ungulates (deer and goats) are the biggest threat to wild plants throughout the East Coast - Hawke’s Bay which is the where the entire wild population occurs, usually on bluffs and steep slips where browsing animals sometimes struggle to reach plants. Both these sites have benefited from ongoing current Department of Conservation aerial goat and deer control programme in reserves and on neighbouring private land.

This programme along the boundary of Te Urewera serves two main purposes

• reduction in deer and goat numbers within these reserves which allows wild kakabeak population to persist with some level of recruitment.
• preventing goats from establishing in wider Te Urewera forest track from northern Hawkes Bay. Te Urewera is largely currently goat free and any establishment of goat populations within Te Urwera would be devastating for the forest ecosystems present on top of already high deer numbers, and would be extremely expensive and difficult to eradicate once established.

The control programme has been run and partly funded to date by the Department of Conservation. If this program was to stop if these blocks were added to Te Urewera there is a significant risk that this may lead to the possible loss of the existing kakabeak populations in these reserves, pushing the national population closer towards extinction, as well the obvious risk of goat populations establishing in Te Urewera.

Authority’s advice

The Authority are concerned with the process proposed for the transfer of the land into Te Urewera. By over-riding the processes established in legislation (Conservation, Reserves and Te Urewera Acts) through simply including the transfer in the settlement legislation, the Crown does not need to take into account the ecological values associated some of the blocks.

There are significant risks for the long-term viability of the kakabeak population with the proposed transfer of Ruakituri Scenic Reserve in particular, and we note that it is not contiguous with Te Urewera. The ecological viability of many of the other reserves, including the kakabeak plants in Waikareiti Conservation Area, are somewhat dependent on the ongoing deer and in particular goat control programme continuing, as most of the reserves have been assessed as having high to exceptional botanical conservation values based on their large size, vegetation types remaining and most (but not all) are contiguous with the much larger Te Urewera forest tract.

• The Authority supports the transfer of the multiple smaller blocks around Kaitawa and Tuai, and the additions of the Mangaone Conservation Area (Map ID #1), Panekirikiri Conservation Area (Map ID #2), and Waihi South Conservation Area (Map ID #4), provided sufficient management of the blocks is in place to protect existing high conservation values.
• The Authority opposes the addition of Waikareiti Conservation Area Map ID #16, and Ruakituri Scenic Reserve Map ID #17 on the basis that their exceptional ecological values, based around significant clusters of kakabeak, are in danger of being compromised. These will require regular and ongoing deer and goat control programmes which, at present, only the Department of Conservation can provide.