October 29, 2012
Māori asked to shoulder burden of climate costs
The chair of the Federation of Māori Authorities says Māori are being asked to shoulder a disproportionate share of the cost of climate change.
Traci Houpapa says FOMA along with the Climate Change Iwi Leaders Group are fighting the Government’s proposed changes to the Emissions Trading Scheme.
She says Māori own more than a third of the country’s production forests, as well as extensive agricultural interests.
She says the Government seems to have decided the ETS is too costly, so it is leaving it to Māori to carry the burden of New Zealand’s international commitment to carbon reduction.
“The majority of the pre-1990 forestry land is Māori-owned. It has come back to us with forestry on it so we are encumbered with an industry that has done us well in terms of employment in some areas but now provides us with the conundrum of go/no go. We are also locked into forestry in some areas where it may not be necessarily or be the most economic or appropriate industry for that land type,” she says.
Ms Houpapa says the current policies are potentially in breach of the Treaty of Waitangi, so the Government needs to find a way to preserve the value of the forestry settlements.
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