$1 Million Fund Launched to Support Community Wilding Pine Control in NZ

Speaking at the national Wilding Pine Conference in Southland today, Biosecurity Minister Andrew Hoggard has announced a new $1 million community funding programme to back grassroots wilding pine control.

The fund, running over two years, will be available from the National Wilding Conifer Control Programme to support community-led control projects. It comes on top of $109 million being invested over the next three years to ramp up control work nationally and get ahead of the spread.

Wilding pines are a scourge on the productive heart of rural New Zealand, and there are plenty of people as passionate as I am about getting rid of them.

Volunteers, landowners and community groups, with help from contractors and councils, are already making enormous progress to tackle infestations. This initiative is about backing those local efforts.

Wilding pines threaten productive farmland, water supplies in sensitive catchments, native biodiversity, and increase the risk of wildfires.

With a problem as big as wilding pines, national coordination is essential, but I also believe in letting local people take charge of local issues, Mr Hoggard says.

Expressions of interest in the new community funding programme are expected to open later this year.