HOW 1BILLION TREE PLAN CAN SUCCEED

THE GOVERNMENT’S MUCH-VAUNTED ONE BILLION Tree planting programme will only work if New Zealand has an effective Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) in place, says PF Olsen’s retiring CEO, Peter Clark.

A strong supporter of the ETS, Peter Clark says the only way New Zealand can meet its Paris Accord commitments by 2030 without incurring a huge cost to the nation is to plant millions of fast-growing trees to suck up more carbon.

“Carbon is a fantastic thing for forestry because it’s fundamentally changed the timeframe between investment and return,” he says.

“That makes a huge difference to anyone that understands NPVs (Net Present Values). With the ETS review that is under way, a part of its mandate is to try and make it easier for existing land owners, like pastoral farmers, to understand and make money out of carbon. The

one billion trees won’t happen unless there is a carbon element to it.

“And I think that if we are to have trees on farms, rather than farms converted to trees, then we probably need some signals about whether and when farmers come into the ETS as well, because trees are a natural hedge against rising carbon prices.”

Peter also says most of the new trees that need to be planted will have to be fast-growing conifers, like Radiata Pine, otherwise they won’t consume enough carbon to prevent New Zealand from having to buy carbon credits on the international market.

He accepts that slow-growing native trees should be planted in key locations, such as the highly erosion-prone hills on the East Coast and they would never be harvested. But he also suggests that other long-lived species, like Redwoods and Douglas-fir, could be part of the carbon planting equation.

NZL