Registration Board Newsletter

Dear Registered Members

With the 2022 year now well underway, the Registration Board wishes to keep you up to date on relevant matters. We also hope that you, your families, and those around you are faring ok, under the ongoing challenges that the Omicron Covid variation has presented us all.

Procedures Manual Update

The Board updated it’s Procedures Manual at  the end of 2021.  This was endorsed by the NZIF Council at their 9 February 2022 meeting. The updated Procedures Manual can be viewed at https://www.nzif.org.nz/members-only-area/registered-members/policy-and-procedures/

The updated Manual includes two new Appendices.

• Appendix 4 - Board Member Conflicts of Interest – Guidance Note
  • This provides documented guidance to the Board on how Board Members should manage any conflict of interest that may arise in them undertaking Registration Board duties. This will assist in the Board acting consistently when managing any conflict of interest matter.
• Appendix 5 - Skills Recognition
  • The Appendix discusses how the Board may progress the recognition and quality assurance of members, wishing to be formally recognized for specialist skills they hold. You may recall from the last newsletter that the Board at its 1 September 2021 meeting temporarily suspended the provision of specialist skills recognition for any new Registered Member applications.  This suspension is still in place. To assist in further progressing this topic, the Board will be undertaking a survey of NZIF members later this month (March) to gain more insight as to what specific approach would be best for members. We look forward to you participation in this survey.  

Kirsten Stuart Co-opted to the Registration Board

At the 9 February 2022 Council meeting, the Council approved the co-opting of mid-career registered member Kirsten Stuart to the Registration Board for 12 months.  The Board is very pleased to have Kirsten join us to bring valued insight and relevant experience to the Board decision making process. We very much appreciate Kirsten being willing to assist the Board.

Annual Certificate of Registration Process

The Board wishes to highlight to Registered Members the need to complete all the requirements for your Annual Certificate of Registration (ACR) by no later than 31 May as you would have been reminded by the Registrar, by email on 9^th February 2022.

Please note your Continuing Professional Development (CPD) records must be entered and submitted by 30 April 2022 to give the Registrar time to check, before the deadline of 31 May 2022 that you have the minimum amount of 10 hours of qualifying CPD. Please also note you should be targeting 20 hours of CPD p.a. to ensure you reach the required 100 hours over five years.

Registration Board Member Profile  

The Board has decided to provide Registered Members with more insight as to who are the people who make up the Board. So as part of each regular newsletter we are profiling a specific Board member.  In the September 2021 newsletter we profiled Ellanese (Elley) Mytton. In December we profiled our longest serving Board Member, Ian Page.   In this newsletter we are profiling Andrew McEwen.

Andrew has been involved in New Zealand forestry since 1962. He is a Registered Forester and an NZIF Fellow. He served on the NZIF Council as a Councillor (2003-04), Vice President (2004-08) and President (2008-14), was elected as a registered member representative to the Board in 2016 and was part of the NZIF team that succeeded in obtaining an exemption under the Real Estate Agents Act for NZIF Registered Members.  Andrew chaired the NZIF Foundation from 2011-2021 and has received a number of awards, including the NZIF Thomas Kirk Award in 2014, a Commonwealth Forestry Association Award of Excellence in 2015 and was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) for services to forestry in the 2016 New Year’s Honours. Andrew and his wife Mary recently accepted an invitation to be joint patrons of Tane’s Tree Trust.

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As flagged by the President, James Treadwell, in his 28 February 2022 newsletter to all Institute members, “Today is the last day for nominations to Council and Registration Board.  I am pleased to see the number of nominations we have received to date, which shows members are engaged and want to have a say in the running of the Institute.  It is going to be a very important two years for us as we either bed down the delegation to run the Forest Advisors’ scheme, or restructure the Institute to take into account the Forest Advisors’ scheme run from elsewhere.”

We have an important period of time ahead for all members of the Institute.

Stay safe and well.

On behalf of the Registration Board

Peter Casey 

Chair

New Zealand Institute of Forestry Registration Board