Making difficult decisions: Mining the conservation estate

In March this year, the Government released a discussion paper proposing that some conservation land be removed from Schedule 4 of the Crown Minerals Act to allow it to be considered for mining. In April the Commissioner presented her view on this proposal. Three days later thousands of people took part in a protest march up Queen Street. 

The public debate that took place over mining on Schedule 4 land was inevitably somewhat muddled. For instance, national parks were taken to be the same as Schedule 4 land, whereas they form a subset of Schedule 4 land. In July the Government decided not to remove any land from Schedule 4, but to pursue other opportunities for expanding mining on public land. This included the 60 percent of the conservation land managed by the Department of Conservation that is not listed on Schedule 4. It is mining on this land that is the focus of this report.