Council Adopts Plan To Manage Forestry Blocks

Thursday, 6 March 2025, 9:31 pm
Article: Diane McCarthy - Local Democracy Reporter

Whakatāne District Council’s living together committee has approved a plan for managing four forestry blocks it owns.

These include the Valley Road block that is currently being harvested, one on Eagles Hill Road, Waimana, which was harvested in 2022, one in Mangamate, Galatea, due for harvest in 2027 and one in Onepū due for harvest in 2044.

Apart from the Eagles Hill block, the forests are on land that was already established in either exotic or indigenous forest before1990. This means they fall under the rules of the Emissions Trading Scheme and the council is required to replant them in forest cover within four years of harvesting. Failure not to do so would result in having to pay New Zealand Units of about $170,000.

The council is planning to replant the 3.8 hectare Valley Road block in native vegetation over the next four years, for which budget will need to be allocated.

At yesterday’s meeting, Councillor Andrew Iles asked what the council was doing to mitigate against flooding caused by slash left behind from the harvesting on Valley Road.

Open spaces manager Ian Molony said staff were working closely with Bay of Plenty Regional Council in terms of meeting its requirements for the consent for harvesting.

“With the helicopter operation that you’ve seen as well, they will be going in there afterwards with a grapple, picking up a lot of that slash and taking it down to the lower reserve areas. We will be looking at chipping it as well.”

The Eagle Hill block is only 0.9 hectares and the council plans to replant it in natives with help from community groups and retain it as a community asset.

The Mangamate block is 26ha and the council expects to receive some income from it following harvesting. Post harvesting the council plans to replant it in native vegetation and seek to revert ownership to the Crown.

The largest of the forestry blocks is in Onepu, with 30.3ha adjacent to Military and Grieve Roads two kilometres west of Te Teko.

The block is expected to provide an income to the council when it is harvested in 20 year’s time. The council plans to explore short-term multi-use opportunities to make it more of a community asset in the meantime.

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