Friday 15 June 2018
Horizons Regional Council is extremely pleased to learn today that it is the recipient of nearly $1 million from central
government’s Provincial Growth Fund to plant 1.35 million trees this winter.
The $970,600 funding announcement was made by Forestry and Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones today in
Ohakune, along with an announcement regarding a $10 million loan for a high speed gondola at Mt Ruapehu.
Horizons chair and Accelerate25 lead team member Bruce Gordon says the council has been working on an additional
planting programme proposal since central government announced its goal to plant one billion trees across the country.
“While the One Billion Trees programme application process is being finalised for next year, we are really excited that
there is an opportunity to get funding for planting this winter,” he says.
“We appreciate the faith central government is showing in our programmes through providing us with this funding.
“Today’s announcement will make a significant contribution to the Mānuka and land optimisation opportunities identified
in the Manawatū-Whanganui Economic Action Plan as well as provideenvironmental benefits to the region.
Horizons group manager natural resources and partnerships Dr Jon Roygard says the council’s planting programme includes
planting 1.35 million trees over 1,000 hectares of erosion-prone farm land throughout the region by the end of September
2018.
“We are now on track to plant approximately 1.35 million trees into forestry, made up of over 800,000 Mānuka plants and
the rest being predominantly radiata pine seedlings and a small amount of alternative species. There will be many
benefits of this scale of planting, including erosion control in our hill country and improving water quality by
reducing sediment in rivers.”
“We have 30-40 landowners lined up ready to go primarily through our Sustainable Land Use Initiative (SLUI) and are
confident that we will see all the trees planted by the end of winter. We acknowledge and thank the landowners for
getting involved, making their land available and putting in their own contribution to the forests being established.”
Dr Roygard says another component to the Provincial Growth Fund announcement is funding to enable forestry assessments
to be completed.
“These assessments are to enable landowners who are considering forestry on their farm to have customised analysis
completed, providing further information for decision making. We encourage any landowners who are considering forestry
as part of their farming system to contact Horizons’ land team via land@horizons.govt.nz to discuss this further.”
To find out more information about Horizons’ planting programmes, including their winter #PlantInOurRegion campaign, see www.horizons.govt.nz.
ENDS