Afternoon address
National Environmental Reporting Forum 20 October 2009
From the National Environmental Reporting Forum 20 October 2009.
Justine Daw
Manager, Statistics and Geospatial
Ministry for the Environment
- Welcome back to today’s Third National Environmental Reporting Forum. We had nearly 200 people interested in attending today’s Forum. While we regrettably had to turn some people away because of venue limitations, it is really encouraging to see so many people recognising the value of sharing information and innovations in environmental monitoring and reporting, and working together to achieve common goals in this space.
- And collectively we’ve made some excellent progress since the last Forum. The LUCAS presentation this morning highlighted the significant investment made in national land use mapping and carbon analysis, which also brings a number of wider benefits. As one example, the LUCAS forest monitoring essentially constitutes the first national forest inventory in New Zealand since the 1940s, and will serve as a basis for DOC’s biodiversity monitoring system in future.
- We have also made good progress in setting the foundation for a nationally consistent approach to freshwater monitoring and reporting, and some of the presentations this morning have outlined possible ideas for this. An inventory of environmental indicators is also under development, which is the first step in establishing a proposed online environmental indicator library. Last but not least we are bringing people together this afternoon to start a conversation about how we can work together to create a more comprehensive and integrated national marine monitoring network. And there are a number of other initiatives and conversations which we encourage you to join in on.
- As Todd Krieble outlined this morning, we all acknowledge the need for accurate and comprehensive information on the quality of our environment when deciding how best to protect and manage our environment, and allocate precious finite resources such as water.
- With your help, MfE has been working hard to update the 66 national datasets that comprise the core set of environmental indicators in the 20 months since the last state of environment report. We’ve updated over half of these datasets, and have made a number of significant improvements in our reporting work as we’ve done so. But we are struggling to update other datasets cheaply and easily, and report them in a more meaningful way. And so we have begun to focus on areas of real priority for us: we have made some real gains in freshwater reporting and we are also exploring how to provide more meaningful national-scale information on land and soils. This work ties in closely with the New Start for Fresh Water work programme and the work of the Land and Water Forum.
- As I’ve said at past Forum meetings, we have all heard the need to do better and do it differently. To get there we’re going to have to work together in new and different ways. But there is not a lot of new funding around as the country eases it way out of recession. This probably means that we won’t be able to achieve a Rolls Royce model; rather we will have to focus on what’s possible in a ‘Mini’ world. And this also means that we will have to use the resources that we do have creatively and direct them to the most important issues.
- And here’s my challenge for you today. The environmental reporting we do at a national level is only as good as the data that is available. That is such a significant concept I will repeat it: The environmental reporting we do at a national level is only as good as the data that is available. With the exception of waste data, MfE is totally reliant on your agencies, your monitoring networks and programmes, and your time and energy to be able to pull together a national picture of the environment.
- And that’s harder than it sounds, particularly when some environmental issues of importance are not monitored across the whole country, when environmental information is difficult to access; when time series data is not readily available; when data is out of date and not updated regularly; when a number of agencies hold datasets that might be more meaningful when combined, and when we may not be able to afford the monitoring or modeling regimes that are needed to provide a meaningful assessment of environmental health. MfE is ready to provide leadership and resourcing to help improve the situation, but ultimately we are going to need your collective help.
- This is particularly important as we start to think ahead and prepare for the 2012 State of the Environment report. It is in everyone’s interests to ensure that that report has a better set of national-scale environmental monitoring data to draw on.
- I look forward to some lively and fruitful discussions this afternoon.
Last updated: 23 October 2009
