Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
Councils will not need to comply with rules protecting places with rare and threatened wildlife for three years while the Resource Management Act is replaced, it has been announced.
It is a move the Green Party has labelled "short-sighted".
Significant Natural Areas - or SNAs - are places in New Zealand where rare or threatened plants or animals are found.
Their protection is required under the Resource Management Act 1991.
Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard made the announcement to suspend the need to comply with SNA rules on Thursday.
"As it stands, SNAs identified on private property limit new activities and development that can take place on that property. In their current form they represent a confiscation of property rights and undermine conservation efforts by the people who care most about the environment: the people who make a living from it," Hoggard said.
"As part of the ACT-National coalition agreement the government committed to ceasing the implementation of new SNAs. This work will be carried out as part of the government's RMA reforms. For now, the government has agreed to suspend the obligation for councils to impose SNAs under the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity, and we're sending a clear message that it would be unwise to bother."
Hoggard said the government was proposing to make the changes quickly to ensure councils and communities did not waste resources and effort implementing rules that may change.
"I have also asked for a review of the operation of existing SNAs more broadly, including those implemented under the powers that councils have in the RMA. This review is being scoped now."
The Green Party said adding SNAs to its "already roaring environmental policy bonfire" was "an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique".
The party's environment spokesperson Lan Pham said SNAs represented locations that some of the country's rarest and most threatened native plants and species lived.
Green Party environment spokesperson Lan Pham. Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon
"Suspending the identification of SNAs and jeopardising existing ones condemns our flora and fauna to a future of continued decline and degradation."
Pham said the government was "whipping up fear" of SNAs for its own gain.
"This short-sighted thinking from the government will be of detriment to future generations by depriving them of the opportunity to enjoy this country's natural world as we and those who have come before us have."
Labour leader Chris Hipkins said it was "another example of the government winding things back without a plan to move forward".
"You know, the SNAs are an important policy in terms of protecting our indigenous biodiversity, in terms of making sure that actually the planet that we pass on to future generations is one they can continue to sustain life with.
"I know it's a policy that for a small number of landowners, they had quite an interest in that, but actually, in the bigger scheme of things it's a pretty important one."
Speaking at Field Days in Feilding after the announcement, Hoggard said farmers were already protecting biodiversity on their farms, pointing to Queen Elizabeth II covenants.
"We've got ... 180,000 hectares have been put in QE II trust over the years ... another I think it's around 2 million more hectares on sheep and beef land that's already in biodiversity, but not formally covenanted."
He said things like having greater recognition of native plantings under the Emissions Trading Scheme, or introducing biodiversity credits, could help reward farmers for putting in the work to protect the environment.
"To be honest, some of these areas that have been designated SNAs, there's not a lot of significance there. It's just sort of a blanket approach on a desktop level where you're not having people walk into the paddocks and go 'well, actually, what's happening here'."
"It's not been done properly at the moment. And this is about giving people their rights back and encouraging them with better ways."
