Turei Metiria: General Debate 
Turei Metiria: General Debate 
[Volume:638;Page:8630] 
METIRIA TUREI (Green) 
: 
Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker. The proposal by the fishing industry to establish benthic protection areas has just been released. I recognise that the Minister is attempting to do his best to provide protection for the marine environment and has struggled with competition and issues from the industry but frankly this proposal fails to deliver any real benefit to the ecology of the bottom-trawled marine area. 
There are a couple of good things in the proposal. It is good to see good controls on trawling in the benthic protection areas—two observers satellite tracking and electronically monitored nets. That is good. The 100-metre buffer zone is very good. Nets have to be at least 100 metres above the seabed and there are severe fines and enforcement if those nets go below 50 metres. That is all good too. 
But the purpose of this proposal was to provide real conservation gains for the bottom-trawled marine environment—and it has failed to do so. Seventy-seven percent of the trawling that has occurred in these protected areas has occurred in only three of them. Hardly any trawling occurs in most of the areas that are being protected. 
The Minister has agreed to cap the revenue from the industry for research until 2013 which means that research revenue will drop for marine conservation research by about $300000 to $400000 per year. So not only will the Government be putting in its own money which is not necessarily a bad thing but the industry itself will save money on research. That is absolutely crucial because we need as many research dollars as possible going into this area. 
Conservationists have been extremely critical of this industry proposal. In its original form it was subject to severe criticism including criticism from one of the Government’s own agencies the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research Ltd. A report produced in about September of last year stated: “With respect of the BPAs [Benthic Protection Areas] proposed by the fishing industry our results indicate that implementation of these would produce low returns in terms of demersal fish conservation.” It went on to state: “On the basis of our results we conclude that despite their large geographic area the focus of this proposal on existing areas that have both very low fishing value and low fish diversity makes it a poor option for the long-term protection of dermersal fish diversity in New Zealand’s EEZ.” The proposal simply fails to do the job. 
That report was based on the original proposal so where does this new proposal sit? Let us have a look. First of all I should mention that the other key question here is around the management of fish stocks and what that means for fishing. Eighteen thousand tonnes of fish have been taken out of these areas—that is the proposed protected areas—since 1989. This is less than 3 percent of the total quantity of fish taken from New Zealand waters in any one year and ends up over the period of time since 1989 being about less than 0.2 percent of the fish taken out of these waters. So from a fishing point of view these protected areas do not provide high value to the industry. 
What exactly then is the industry giving up? The answer is nothing; they are not giving up anything. I have two maps here. The first shows an area indicating both the intended protection areas and the areas where the bottom trawling actually occurs. Members can see there is very little overlap. That was the original proposal. The new proposal adds about 2 percent extra area and none of that is within the predominant bottom trawling areas. Again what is the industry giving up here? What are industry members proposing? They are proposing nothing that will cost them anything because they do not trawl in these areas they are wanting to protect. This is a form of “greenwashing” by the industry; it is not a form of marine conservation. 
The critique then of the original proposal by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research Ltd remains because the areas that the institute was critiquing are the same areas that are now included in this proposal which therefore has very low value in terms of fishing and very low value in terms of biodiversity and protection. Other methods could be used that would provide a much greater level of protection of the marine environment. The net result of this proposal is that there is very limited value in closing off these areas to bottom trawling. Despite the fact that the areas sound large they do not provide the kind of value that was expected. 
This makes for great public relations for the fishing industry and the Seafood Industry Council has put out its press release saying that it has won a victory here. But it is not a victory for conservation or for the New Zealand public.