The Green Party supports the Government’s move to close temporarily shellfish and seaweed fisheries on the east coast of the South Island in the wake of last week’s Kaikōura earthquakes. “Closing the crayfish fishery for a month and paua and other shell fisheries for three months to investigate the impacts of the earthquake on them is sensible,” said Green Party primary industries spokesperson Eugenie Sage. “A one month temporary closure, however, is not nearly enough time for crayfish and paua...

Animals will continue to be subjected to unnecessary pain and distress because the Government has refused to take serious action to address cruelty in rodeo, the Green Party said today. Almost 63,000 New Zealanders signed a petition asking for rodeo to be banned, but the Primary Production Select Committee, which is led by Government MPs and has just released its final report into the issue, has been largely unresponsive to those concerns. “Rodeo is both outdated and cruel – it’s...

New Zealanders’ health is being put at risk by a chemical in commonly used weedkillers that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) doesn’t even require companies to publicly disclose is in its compounds, the Green Party said today. At least 89 herbicide and pesticide products in New Zealand, including products commonly found in many Kiwi garden sheds, contain polyoxyethylene tallow amine (POEA), which has been named in today’s Pesticide Action Network monograph as having serious health effects. The EU Commission has also...

The Minister for Primary Industries Nathan Guy must step up and investigate failures in his ministry and fisheries management, which are allowing widespread fish dumping to threaten the sustainability of fish stocks, the Green Party said today. The comments come on the back of an email from a senior Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI) official saying that if the current law was enforced, half of all inshore fishers would go out of business. This means that not only is fish...

The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) must stop letting commercial fishers off the hook for illegal fish dumping, the Green Party said today.

The Green Party is calling on the Government to ban the toxic ingredient POEA, after answers to written questions to the Minister for the Environment revealed it is an undisclosed ingredient in almost 90 products sold in New Zealand. The European Union (EU) Commission has recommended that EU member states ban the use of Polyoxyethylene tallow amine (POEA), a common ingredient in herbicides like Roundup, which researchers expect could cause cell damage and death, and may cause pregnancy problems including...

Endangered native sea lions will continue to be killed in commercial fishing nets unless the Government takes stronger action than is proposed in a flimsy Threat Management Plan, the Green Party said today. Submissions close today on the proposed Threat Management Plan for the New Zealand sea lion/rāpoka. The plan suggests several streams of new research, but doesn’t make changes to fishing rules to reduce sea lions being caught and drowning in fishing nets. “We don’t allow hunters to accidently...

The Green Party is calling for stricter controls on the fishing industry after it was revealed thousands of seabirds, hundreds of fur seals, and dozens of dolphins were killed by trawl nets in just one year. A new report has just been released that analyses data from fisheries observers to identify levels of bycatch. In 2013-14, an estimated 81 dolphins were killed in the jack mackerel trawl fishery and an estimated 2,277 seabirds, including threatened species such as Salvin’s mollyhawk and...

The Green Party is congratulating the organics sector on taking major steps this weekend to unify the sector, as well as wishing the Soil & Health Association a happy 75th birthday. In a show of the sector’s strength and confidence about the future, major organics organisations Soil & Health and BioGro New Zealand have combined to bring their significant strengths together, and sector umbrella organisation Organics Aotearoa New Zealand has chosen to expand its membership, embracing key food industry players...

The Government must suspend the commercial catch of New Zealand's longfin eel, and accept the conclusion by Parliament's environment watchdog that the eel is on a path to extinction, the Green Party said today. In her submission on the Government's catch limits for South Island eel fisheries, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment recommended that the commercial catch of longfin eels should be suspended until it is clear the species is recovering. “The Government can take the simple step of...