Deforestation in New Zealand has been a contentious

environmental issue Environmental issues are effects of human activity on the biophysical environment, most often of which are harmful effects that cause environmental degradation. Environmental protection is the practice of protecting the natural environment on th ...

in the past, but native forests (colloquially called "

the bush "The bush" is a term mostly used in the English vernacular of Australia and New Zealand where it is largely synonymous with '' backwoods'' or ''hinterland'', referring to a natural undeveloped area. The fauna and flora contained within this a ...

") now have legal protection, and are not allowed to be tampered with by humans.

Pre-human forest cover

Since

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

was the last major landmass to be settled by humans,

anthropological Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...

changes are easier to study than in countries with a longer human history. A picture of the vegetation cover has been built up through the use of archeological and fossil remains, especially

pollen Pollen is a powdery substance produced by seed plants. It consists of pollen grains (highly reduced microgametophytes), which produce male gametes (sperm cells). Pollen grains have a hard coat made of sporopollenin that protects the gametophyt ...

grains from old forests. Intact forests are found on

Stewart Island Stewart Island ( mi, Rakiura, ' glowing skies', officially Stewart Island / Rakiura) is New Zealand's third-largest island, located south of the South Island, across the Foveaux Strait. It is a roughly triangular island with a total land ar ...

and Ulva Island, but during the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

these areas would have been covered in grass and shrubland. During the last glacial maximum podocarp, broadleaf and beech forest grew in the far north of New Zealand.

Māori settlement

Prior to

Māori Māori or Maori can refer to: Relating to the Māori people * Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group * Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand * Māori culture * Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...

arrival, New Zealand was almost entirely forested, besides high alpine regions and those areas affected by volcanic activity. Māori began settling the country about 1000 years ago and by 1840, when Europeans were a small part of the total population, the

forest cover Forest cover is the amount of forest that covers a particular area of land. It may be measured as relative (in percent) or absolute (in square kilometres/square miles). Around a third of the world's surface is covered with forest, with closed-canop ...

is said to have been significantly reduced from 85% down to 53%.

European settlement

Te Akatea bushfire - Auckland Libraries AWNS-19110309-13-3

When the first Europeans arrived, in 1769, there was still thick, dense forest cover. Early explorers such as

Cook Cook or The Cook may refer to: Food preparation * Cooking, the preparation of food * Cook (domestic worker), a household staff member who prepares food * Cook (professional), an individual who prepares food for consumption in the food industry * ...

and

Banks A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

described the land as "immense woods, lofty trees and the finest timber".Wynn, G. ‘Destruction under the guise of improvement: The forest, 1840-1920’, in Pawson and Brooking, (eds), Environmental History of New Zealand, (2002), 100-118. Timber was mainly used for repairs to sailing ships until the 19th century. With the colony of

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

rapidly expanding in population, the need for timber from New Zealand began to rise. Timber exports, mainly

kauri ''Agathis'', commonly known as kauri or dammara, is a genus of 22 species of evergreen tree. The genus is part of the ancient conifer family Araucariaceae, a group once widespread during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, but now largely res ...

, became a major industry for New Zealand. There are records from the 1840s stating that 50 to 100 ships could be tied to shore in

Kaipara Harbour Kaipara Harbour is a large enclosed harbour estuary complex on the north western side of the North Island of New Zealand. The northern part of the harbour is administered by the Kaipara District and the southern part is administered by the Auckl ...

and be filled with lumber from giant floating booms that could hold 10,000 logs at a time. Besides as a form of lumber, many pioneers found the kauri trees valuable for the gum they produced to make varnish and linoleum, primarily in the north island near

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

. The colonists used unconventional methods to gather this gum from living trees. Stripping these trees and the ground around them resulted in the destruction of the land, rendering it unusable for agriculture (Wynn pg. 108). Without the trees to hold the soil and debris to the land, water flowed freely, causing frequent and regular flooding. As most of New Zealand was covered with thick bush, the

slash-and-burn Slash-and-burn agriculture is a farming method that involves the cutting and burning of plants in a forest or woodland to create a field called a swidden. The method begins by cutting down the trees and woody plants in an area. The downed vegeta ...

technique was often used to prepare land wanted for farming in forested areas. This practice was not carried out very responsibly due to the complexity of controlling a fire, and unintentionally resulted in large areas of land catching fire. Thousands of acres were accidentally burned and destroyed. After the

Treaty of Waitangi The Treaty of Waitangi ( mi, Te Tiriti o Waitangi) is a document of central importance to the history, to the political constitution of the state, and to the national mythos of New Zealand. It has played a major role in the treatment of the M ...

was signed in 1840, settlers begin a rapid expansion. Deforestation continued for many uses, including clearing land for farming and gardens and wood for construction. An estimated of land was also lost due to human-caused forest fires within only a few days.

Settlers A settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established a permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. A settler who migrates to an area previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited may be described as a pioneer. Settle ...

were often granted land, such as the Homesteads, with a condition that they forfeited it if they didn't clear enough bush. The rising rate of deforestation can be correlated with a sudden rise in sawmill usage. There were only six sawmills in 1843, twelve in 1847, fifteen in 1855 and ninety-three in 1868, a growth of more than fifteen times in twenty-five years. Many saw-milling settlements were in turn supported by becoming railroad stops, leading to more clearance and job availability. With time, the mills also became more productive. These factors helped create an exponential rate of deforestation across the country. Although in 1885 the State Forest Department set aside forests to protect timber resources, for 100 years New Zealand farmers were paid incentives or provided with subsidies to clear land of trees or "improve" land for agriculture. Half of New Zealand is now converted to agricultural land, for example most of the river flats of the west coast are now pastures. Removing forests contributed to the extinction of endemic species. By removing New Zealand native forest, humans created a landscape with the climatic conditions to allow the short-horned grasshopper ''Phaulacridium marginale'' to expand its range across the country.

Recent history

By the 1970s the

environmental movement The environmental movement (sometimes referred to as the ecology movement), also including conservation and green politics, is a diverse philosophical, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues. Environmentalists a ...

started direct action to protect New Zealand's forests. Notable direct action campaigns were at Pureora Forest with

Stephen King Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, crime, science-fiction, and fantasy novels. Described as the "King of Horror", a play on his surname and a reference to his high s ...

and the

West Coast West Coast or west coast may refer to: Geography Australia * Western Australia *Regions of South Australia#Weather forecasting, West Coast of South Australia * West Coast, Tasmania **West Coast Range, mountain range in the region Canada * Britis ...

with the

Native Forest Action Council Native Forest Action Council was an environmental organisation in New Zealand. It was formed in 1975 from what was the Beech Forest Action Committee to advocate for the protection of native forests and changed its name to the Maruia Society in ...

and

Native Forest Action Native Forest Action (NFA) was set up protect the publicly owned native forests of the West Coast of the South Island of New Zealand from logging. The West Coast has extensive stands of virgin native forests and numerous organisations had lobbie ...

. All native forest logging on public land ended in 2002 when the

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

-led government upheld its election promise to stop the logging. In 2005 forestry covered over , or 29% of the country, made up of of native forest and of planted forests. That

Stats NZ Statistics New Zealand ( mi, Tatauranga Aotearoa), branded as Stats NZ, is the public service department of New Zealand charged with the collection of statistics related to the economy, population and society of New Zealand. To this end, Stats ...

estimate was made up of areas over with at least 10%

crown cover Crown closure, in forestry, is a measure of forest canopy coverage. Crown closure and crown cover are two slightly different measures of the forest canopy and that determine the amount of light able to penetrate to the forest floor. Crown closu ...

and a potential minimum height of at maturity. Other measurements vary, so that one 2010 estimate, based on

MPI MPI or Mpi may refer to: Science and technology Biology and medicine * Magnetic particle imaging, an emerging non-invasive tomographic technique * Myocardial perfusion imaging, a nuclear medicine procedure that illustrates the function of the hear ...

figures, put native forest at (24%) and total tree cover at 30%, but another that same year said 31.40% of New Zealand was covered by forest. This does not include orchards or trees in parks. This figure has been slowly but steadily rising since 1998. By 2018 the estimated planted area had risen to .

Forest protection

Many legal avenues now exist to protect New Zealand's native forests. The

Resource Management Act The Resource Management Act (RMA) passed in 1991 in New Zealand is a significant, and at times, controversial Act of Parliament. The RMA promotes the sustainable management of natural and physical resources such as land, air and water. New Zea ...

, a major Act of Parliament that was passed in 1991, affords any

natural environment The natural environment or natural world encompasses all life, living and non-living things occurring nature, naturally, meaning in this case not Artificiality, artificial. The term is most often applied to the Earth or some parts of Earth. Th ...

a level of legal protection through the

resource consent A resource consent is the authorisation given to certain activities or uses of natural and physical resources required under the New Zealand Resource Management Act (the "RMA"). Some activities may either be specifically authorised by the RMA or ...

process. The logging of native trees is governed by a permit system administered by the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) and must be shown to be sustainable. MPI also formulates policy on national and international

illegal logging Illegal logging is the harvest, transportation, purchase or sale of timber in violation of laws. The harvesting procedure itself may be illegal, including using corrupt means to gain access to forests; extraction without permission, or from a pro ...

. In 2014 special legislation was passed to allow the extraction of large numbers of

rimu ''Dacrydium cupressinum'', commonly known as rimu, is a large evergreen coniferous tree endemic to the forests of New Zealand. It is a member of the southern conifer group, the podocarps. The Māori name ''rimu'' comes from the Polynesian ...

trees which had toppled in a storm in the

South Island The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...

. In early periods, rimu was the timber widely used in construction. After 1950, it was replaced with treated exotic ''

Pinus radiata ''Pinus radiata'' ( syn. ''Pinus insignis''), the Monterey pine, insignis pine or radiata pine, is a species of pine native to the Central Coast of California and Mexico (Guadalupe Island and Cedros island). It is an evergreen conifer in the fa ...

'', but small amounts were milled for furniture into the 1990s.

References

External links

Forest and Bird
- the largest nationwide conservation organisation in New Zealand
Indigenous forestry
at the Ministry for Primary Industries
New Zealand Forest Information and Data
at Mongabay {{Deforestation Environmental issues in New Zealand

Forestry in New Zealand