Climate Change Commission

NZIF in conjunction with the Climate Change Commission is organising a South Island meeting to discuss the Commissions advice on the second emissions reduction plan. This is your opportunity to hear from the commission and to ask them questions and enter into discussion.

The meeting will be held on the 31st of May 9am - 11am at the School of Forestry, Lecture Hall F1. The room seats 55 and this will be filled on a first in first served basis. You can also join online. If you are wanting to attend in person or online, please book a ticket. There is paid car parking on campus but it is enforced by UC Security.

The link to the latest advice from the Commission on the second Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) is here:

https://www.climatecommission.govt.nz/our-work/advice-to-government-topic/advice-for-preparation-of-emissions-reduction-plans/2023-draft-advice-to-inform-the-strategic-direction-of-the-governments-second-emissions-reduction-plan-april-2023/#read-draft-advice

The full document is 216 pages but the core elements of interest to our industry are covered in the following 19 pages:

• The Chair’s comments (pages 1-2)
• The CE’s comments (pages 3-4)
• The Executive Summary (7-12)
• The Proposed Recommendations (pages 13-14, and especially recommendations 3 and 15)
• Chapter 10: Forests (pages 126-132

Familiarity with at least this material will ensure a productive session with the Commissions representatives. 

In short, the Commission is now saying while it still sees a role for forestry the role needs to be “urgently addressed” so we don’t get too much offsetting. In order to ensure the balance between emissions reduction and offsetting they are proposing the ETS is amended to separate gross emissions reductions from those related to forestry and the ETS is also amended to provide greater incentive for longer lived species (notably native).

We have advised the Commission most of the discussion is likely to focus on their recently released advice but nothing is off the table. If people do have specific additional areas they would like covered, it could be useful to let Raewyn know what those are and so we can ensure the CCC is pre-armed to address them.

The agenda will follow a simple format of:

• Introductions and Purpose (10 mins)
• Context of the CCC document and process from here (20 mins)
• General discussion Q&A (1.5 hrs)

If you would like to extend this invite to non NZIF members, please feel free; however you will need to add them to your ticket.