Making the environment count

Climate Change Minister James Shaw says Stats NZ’s release of their first combined Environmental Economic Accounts will provide a valuable basis for understanding New Zealand’s transition to a low emissions economy.

The System of Environmental Economic Accounts (SEEA), released today, measures the interactions between the environment and the economy in a way that has not been done before in New Zealand.

As Associate Minister for Finance with responsibility for overseeing sustainability indicators, Mr Shaw said this new environmental economic data will also help explore whether we are sustaining our environmental assets for future generations.

“This is a crucial step in gathering together the kind of information government, business and the primary industries sectors need for good decision-making around sustainable low emission ways of operating,” James Shaw said.

“While it’s pleasing to see that New Zealand’s greenhouse gas emissions have risen more slowly than general economic growth over the past 25 years, our emissions have still increased by 24 percent, and that demonstrates part of the challenge we face if we are to reach our net zero emissions target by 2050,” Mr Shaw said.

“And there are gaps in the data; in the area of waste, for instance, but officials are working with stakeholders to fill in those gaps for future environmental economic accounts,” he said.

The Environment Minister, David Parker, has also welcomed the release of the new system of accounting.

“It’s another way to integrate environmental accountability with the way the economy works,” Mr Parker said.

END

Volunteer

The Greens are proud to be driven by passionate people like you. Today we need your help to take action on the biggest issues facing Aotearoa. Volu...

Action

Save Auckland's Climate Budget

Sign the petition to stop Mayor Wayne Brown's proposal for dangerous cuts to climate and environmental programmes that protect us from extreme weat...

Action

No New Mines 2023

Action

Expand Voting

Now more than ever, young people in Aotearoa are impacted by Government decisions, and they deserve to have a say. We are calling on all Members of...

Action

End Intensive Winter Grazing

Sign the petition to Labour Ministers, to move faster in bringing regulations into force and end intensive winter grazing.

Action

Trains for Climate

Add your name to our open letter urging the Minister for Finance Grant Robertson to save our passenger trains between Wellington, the Wairarapa and...

Action

Healthy Oceans 2022

Join our Healthy Oceans Crew to help us keep the health and protection of our oceans high on the Labour Government’s political agenda.

Action

It's time: A Ministry for Rainbow Communities

Join our call asking the Prime Minister to establish a Ministry for Rainbow Communities that can champion Rainbow issues.

Action

No new mines on conservation land

Sign the open letter asking Labour Ministers to stick to their promise of banning new mining projects on conservation land.

Action

Allow community ownership of our buses

Public transport is an essential service and helps to tackle the climate crisis by reducing our carbon emissions. But there are barriers to communi...

Action

Local Events

We have activists across Aotearoa / New Zealand who are working hard to build a brighter future for our kids and grandkids. This page lists upcomin...

Latest Environment Announcements

Story

Green Party calls for stronger action by Auckland Council to protect urban trees and native forest

The Green Party is calling on Auckland Council to do more to protect urban trees and housing developer Aedifice Property Group to restore and repla...

You wood not believe it: Greens secure win for urban trees

The Green Party’s advocacy has secured an amendment to the Natural and Built Environment Bill at a crucial stage of the Parliamentary process to en...

Forestry sector must compensate for slash damage

The Green Party welcomes today’s release of the report of the Ministerial Inquiry into slash and sediment, and are clear that the forestry industry...

Greens launch petition to protect conservation lands from mining by Mineralogy International Limited

The Green Party has today launched a petition calling for conservation land to be protected from mining by big overseas companies such as Mineralog...

National's drought of ideas won't help farmers facing climate change

Christopher Luxon and the National Party have once again presented another lazy, back-of-the-napkin policy to Aotearoa.

Freshwater crisis needs stronger government action

New Zealand’s rivers, lakes and freshwater are in crisis and there needs to be a more ambitious Government plan to clean them up and protect agains...

Story

Climate future of communities on the line this election

Green Party co leader James Shaw attended a South Dunedin Future street meeting today to discuss local responses to climate change.

National’s climate pledge a joke

Today’s pledge from the National Party to deliver net zero carbon by 2050 is a bad-faith, disingenuous, and empty promise.

National needs to come clean about climate cuts

The National Party needs to come clean about the impact of its plan to raid the climate budget and cancel $2 billion of investment in action to cut...

New $750m fund part of Climate-Safe Communities plan to protect towns and cities from flooding

The Green Party has today announced a Climate-Safe Communities plan to both cut emissions and protect our communities from the impact of climate ch...

James Shaw - Climate Safe Communities Speech

A family whose home was flooded to the ceiling of the ground floor. The kitchen, dining and living rooms filled as completely as a fish-tank.

Cabinet’s emissions pricing plan leaves too much to chance

Only the Green Party has a plan to reduce agricultural emissions at the scale and pace needed. The Labour Cabinet’s plan for pricing agriculture em...

Story

A Greener way to measure success

Green Party Co-Leaders Marama Davidson and James Shaw have welcomed today’s announcement by Statistics New Zealand that a broad set of indicators w...

Work gets underway to develop better measures of New Zealand’s success

James Shaw, Green Party co-leader and the Minister of Statistics, today launched the development of a new comprehensive set of environmental, socia...

New Zealand Adopts International Open Data Charter

Statistics Minister James Shaw says ensuring government-held data is used to help achieve better outcomes for New Zealanders is a key reason why th...