Welcome

Hi & welcome to NZAEE's (Christchurch Branch) ecoNet Newsletter.

Feel free to pass on news of ecoNet Newsletter and our subscription address: eventdiary@environment.org.nz to others you think may find it interesting/useful.

To supplement the diary here's a selection of news and articles and bits and pieces of interest from around and about, and here and there, e.g:

from here

Canterbury & South Island:

Christchurch City Libraries' 150th anniversary: Librarians put down pukapuka, take up tukutuku. (20 April, CCC).

Social housing unit rent rises "to assure future of CCC social housing". (23 April, CCC).

Christchurch: Motorway extension gets funding approval. (20 April, ECan).

Historic addition to Canterbury's public land: Te Kahui Kaupeka Conservation Park. (23 April, DOC).

Nelson: Fight steps up to save history. Nelson's dedicated posse of heritage guardians. (20 April, Nelson Mail).

Opuha: Greens, farmers meet to discuss water storage. (23 April, Timaru Herald/Stuff).

Timaru: Free for all - ANZAC Day buses. (22 April, ECan).

Timaru: Bird survey planned for upper Rangitata River. (20 April, Timaru Herald/Stuff).

Happy Valley: Solid Energy puts public exclusion zone in place. Trespassers to face arrest and prosecution. (22 April, National Business Review).

Omakau, Central Otago: Intensive dairy farms encroaching on Crown land & marginal strips. Clutha Fisheries Trust doing its own environmental monitoring of Manuherikia River. (22 April, Otago Daily Times).

Otago Regional Council: Dairy pollution 'disgusting'. 18 farms, 21 Prosecutions. (23 April, Otago Daily Times).

Central Otago/Waitaki: Oteake Conservation Park to be reduced to exclude coal mining area.
Also: Greenpeace angry. (22 April, Otago Daily Times).

Lonely Planet warning: Hordes of tourists to the South Island are affecting the environment. (20 April, Otago Daily Times).

North Island & national:

Power companies ripping off Kiwis?: Electricity suppliers have the ability and incentive to use their market power to make large wealth transfers from consumers to themselves, says expert from Stanford University. (22 April, Dominion Post/Stuff).

Forest & Bird: Protected species kills 'disturbing'. By-catch on fishing boats shows set nets catch more protected species than previously thought. (22 April, NZ Herald).

Treaty policy on conservation land, natural resources reviewed. (22 April, NZ Herald).

The national cycleway: now expected to be a network that could be linked up over time. (20 April, Otago Daily Times).

Masterton: Green light for $25 million sewage plant that will discharge into Masterton's Ruamahanga River. (23 April, Dominion Post/Stuff).

Plastic shopping bags: 'Biodegradable' bags no answer to waste. Shouldn't replace ordinary plastic bags because they don't break down properly in landfills, a waste consultancy company has said. (22 April, NZ Herald).

Scientists' 1660-kilometre squashed-critter rally: Lower Hutt to Northland and back counting road kill. (20 April, Dominion Post/Stuff).

Just two weeks until the duck shooting season but one of the birds listed on the Fish and Game Council's hunting guide has just made it onto DOC's endangered species list. (19 April, TVNZ).

Kids can be water wise - on the web. (23 April, Stuff).

Natural world:
Rimutaka Forest Park: Flight of the kiwis. (20 April, Dominion Post/Stuff).

North West Ruahines: Eastern North Island brown kiwi have bumper breeding season. (22 April, DOC).

Re-linked awards, submissions, consultations etc:

• BOC Where There's Water community environmental grants scheme aims to help communities understand, maintain, protect and improve their water environment. Grants are open to all non-profit community groups and schools. The fund, supplied by BOC, is administered by Water New Zealand. Next round of applications due by Friday, 15 May. More information and project examples at: www.waternz.org.nz
  
  
• Heat pump water heaters: New funding pilot programme for efficient water heating - same grant as for solar. (EECA).
  
  
• For science students (year 1 - 10) : NZ International Science online project. Ten weeks, 27 April - 3 July. (DOC).
  
  
• New Canterbury Home Energy Advice Centre open - free, independent, professional advice to help reduce your energy consumption. (17 March, sustainability.govt.nz).
  
  
• Enviroschools eco-hut challenge: for school-age students to design and build an ecological habitat on their school grounds that enhances all living things around it. March 2009 - March 2010. (Enviroschools.org).
  
  
• ECan's long term plan open for submissions until 28 April. (1 April, ECan).
  
  
• Free, research-based advice on sustainably renovating your home. HomeSmart delivers warmer, healthier homes that are more affordable to run and kinder to the environment. Further details: www.beaconpathway.co.nz. (Homesmart Renovations).
  
  
• Riccarton area Transition Initiative: Mik Dale, postgraduate student at the University of Canterbury (studying Energy Supply Systems), also has a keen interest in sustainability and Transition issues. Mik wants to meet like-minded people to help set up a Transition Initiative in the Riccarton area. Contact for Mik is mikdale@gmail.com.
  (What's Transition about? See here: www.transitiontowns.org.nz and/or: www.transitiontowns.org.nz/christchurch).
  

& from there

• UK: George Monbiot: Everyone in the UK consumes too much. (21 April, The Guardian).
  
  
• UK: Last chance for a green budget. "Time is running out and we need bold measures..." 60 organisations sign an open letter to the British Government. (22 April, The Guardian).
  
  
• Alaska: 400 strong summit meeting of indigenous peoples from 80 countries: Aborigine, Inuit traditions can fight climate change. (19 April, Reuters).
  
  
• China: For the first time China considers setting targets for carbon emissions. (19 April, The Guardian).
  
  
• US researchers: World's major rivers 'drying up'. Analysis of water flows in more than 900 rivers over a 50-year period. (21 April, BBC).
  
  
• US: Global warming study: Heat could kill drought-stressed trees fast. (15 April, Science Daily).
  
  
• UK: Hedgerow trees 'key to UK's biodiversity'. Paying farmers to protect them and to establish more could be crucial. (19 April, Science Daily).
  
  
• UK: Prince Charles to publish attack on big business in eco book and film. (21 April, The Guardian).
  
  
• Food for everyone: 7 steps to solving the food crisis. (Spring 2009, Yes! Magazine).
  
  
• Japan: For young Japanese it's back to the farm - stemming from concern about both the plight of Japan’s young workers and the dismal state of farms. (15 April, New York Times).
  
  
• US: The end is near. (Yay!) The NYT considers the Transition Towns movement. 7 pages. (20 April, New York Times).
  
  
• US: Failure to yield. Evaluating the performance of GE crops. (14 April, Union of Concerned Scientists).
  
  
• Frankfurt: Monsanto sues Germany over GM maize ban. (21 April, Reuters).
  
  
• New study: Farmers' reliance on Roundup may be weakening it's ability to control weeds. (16 April, Science Daily).
  
  
• Sewage plants could be creating 'super bacteria'.These 'super' bugs remain in wastewater and wind up in the environment. Treatment plants do a fine job of removing most pollutants... but they’re ill-equipped to get rid of so-called 'microconstituents' like pharmaceuticals, pesticides and nanoparticles. (16 April, Environmental Health News).
  
  
• US: Microscope shows how some common soil bacteria 'inhale' toxic metals and 'exhale' them in a non-toxic form. (19 March, Science Daily).
  
  
• Mongolia: Global downturn hits Mongolia: falling cashmere demand triggers defaults, forced goat sales and a livestock glut. (20 April, Wall Street Journal).
  
  
• Californians want to pull plug on energy-guzzling TVs - bigger, flatter and fancier TVs have dramatically increased the amount of energy needed. (14 April, SF Gate).
  
  
New technology:

• US: First 'economical process' for making biofuel from algae. (31 March, Science Daily).
  
  
• US: Scientists have combined a discovery from a French garbage dump with breakthroughs in synthetic biology to come up with a new method for turning plant waste into gasoline, without the need of any food sources. (21 April, Reuters).
  
  
• France: Paris using ultracapacitors in hybrid buses. (15 April, ecoGeek).
  
  
• US: The Peapod, top speed 25 mph (40 kmh), member of a growing class of NEV's (Neighbourhood Electric Vehicles). (21 April, ecoGeek).
  
  
• Japan: Flexible, kinetic powered phone. (16 April, ecoGeek).
  
  
  
The natural world:
• Afghanistan: Gets its first national park. (22 April, BBC).
  
  
• Antarctica: Bacteria found thriving beneath glacier. (16 April, Google News).
  
  
• Canada: Missing link - 'fossil seal' that walked. Shows how seals went from land to sea. (22 April, BBC).
  
  
• Kenya: Masai Mara National Reserve. Hoofed mammals in decline. (15 photos). (guardian.co.uk).
  
  

Using ecoNet

Is easy. Just send in to the editor information about an event, activity or submission you want to share and it will go in ecoNet....as long as it's appropriate of course.

ecoNet is put out (Fridays) by Christchurch Branch of NZAEE (NZ Association for Environmental Education), a non-profit, national organisation of people working to promote and support environmental education, lifelong learning and sustainable behaviour throughout New Zealand/Aotearoa.

How do I contribute?

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• contact us

 

 

• Event: The Antidote:

  Spaces to counter mainstream information.
  Poet: Tusiata Avita, speaker:  Paul Maunder, DVD: i: Argentina, indymedia and the questions of communication. (Explores the relationship between media and power)
  When: 6.30 pm Friday, 24 April.
  Where: Otautahi Social Centre, 206 Barbadoes St.
  Cost: $5.00 waged, $2.00 unwaged.
  More info/contact: Jo Walsh 3820 812, or www.katipo.net.nz.
  A Katipo Books fund raiser towards opening a not for profit bookstore in the inner city.
  

• Event: St Albans Harvest Celebration.

  Celebrate the abundance of our backyards and meet other local gardeners.
  When: 2.00 - 4.00 pm Sunday, 26 April.
  Where: Packe Street Community Garden.
  Bring something from your garden to swap (flowers, herbs, veggies, fruit, cuttings, preserves...), and food & drink to share.
  (As part of Transition Initiative St Albans).
  
  

• Event: The Great Xchange: recycle your wardrobe.

  (explanation here. (bethere.co.nz)).
  When: Drop off 12.00 - 1.00 pm. Xchange begins 2.00 pm Sunday, 26 April.
  Where: Burnside Rugby Club, Burnside Park, Memorial Ave.
  Cost: $10.00 admission.
  Info/contact: Sandi 0210 223 3088.
  Official website: www.sizexchange.com.
  
  

• ANZAC Day celebration: Our peacemakers – past & present.

  Format: 5 minute presentations - various speakers, also songs, poems, more.
  When: 5.00 – 6.00 pm Saturday, 25 April.
  Where: WEA, 59 Gloucester St. (opposite the Art Gallery).
  Free Entry. A koha for expenses appreciated. Children welcome.
  Enquiries: Deborah Williams ph 359 3478 or: dmw14@ext.canterbury.ac.nz.
  
  

• Talk: History of Canterbury Museum.

  Speaker: Sally Burrage, emeritus curator of Canterbury Museum history.
  When: 6.00 - 7.00 pm Tuesday,
  28 April.
  Where: Documentary Research Centre, Canterbury Museum.
  
  

• Seminar: the Environmental Valuation Reference Inventory (EVRI) database:

  Improving policy analysis and decision making
  in the 21st century - understanding environmental, health & conservation impacts is critical to supporting policy analysis.
  Presenter: Yves Bourassa, Policy Manager, Environment Canada.
  When: 12.45 – 1.45 pm Wednesday, 29 April.
  Where: Hilgendorf 1 (H1) lecture theatre, Lincoln University.
  RSVP by 20 April to Mark Jones: mjones@linz.govt.nz; or ph (04) 460 0186
  
  

• Green drinks:

  An informal get together for anyone of an environmental hue.
  When: 5.30 pm Thursday, 30 April.
  Where: Downstairs, at the big bay window in the Brew Bar, Dux de Lux, Arts Centre.
  Background info here. (www.greendrinks.org).
  
  

• Talk: Climate Change: The view from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPPC).

  Current understanding of the causes of recent climate change, based on the latest IPCC report, & common arguments against man-made climate change. more here.
  Speaker: Dr Adrian McDonald, University of Canterbury.
  When: 7.00 pm Thursday, 30 April.
  Where: Venue on enrolment. (University of Canterbury).
  Cost: $15.00.
  Contact/registration: Anne 364 2987 ext 4860 or anne.welford@canterbury.ac.nz.
  (First of a series).
  
  

• Talk: What it means to genuinely deal with climate change.

  Speaker: Bill McKibben, US, environmentalist & climate change campaigner (see here), founder of www.350.org. (Interview: here, 23 April, Yale Environment 360).
  When: 9.00 am (public address) &/or 10.00 am (NGO morning tea), Friday, 1 May.
  Where: Conference Room 1, Christchurch Community House.
  see also: www.350.org.nz.
  
  

• Meeting: To consider re-establishing a Christchurch Environment Centre.

  When: 7.00 pm Friday, 1 May.
  Where: Camelia Room, CCC, Tuam St.
  More info/contact: Matt Morris theyellowroom@xtra.co.nz
  Organised by Organic Garden City Trust.
  
  

• Lincoln composting workshops:  What to do with all that garden & household organic waste.

  When: 10.30 am & 2.30 pm Saturday, 2 May.
  Where: Lincoln Community Gardens, Maternity Hospital grounds, James Street. (Please park on the roadside).
  Donation: $5.00 if affordable.
  Contact/info/bookings:  Cello 325 2156.
  
  

• Evening classes: Sustainable Living:

  Home improvements, water conservation, gardening, saving power...more.
  When: 7.00 - 9.00 pm Monday, 4 May.
  Where: Riccarton High School.
  Also:
  When: 7.00 - 9.00 pm Tuesday, 5 May.
  Where: Cashmere High School.
  To enrol ring the respective school.
  Contact/more info: 960 2656 or rhys@sustainableliving.org.nz.
  
  

• Wellington event: Power Up: a climate change action hui.

  Where: Crossways Community Centre, Wellington Central.
  When: Thurs, April 30 - Saturday, May 2.
  More info/contact: caroline@sustaintrust.org.nz, ph 04 389 3400 ext 705.
  Supported by Hikurangi Foundation.
  
  

• EARTHWISE, Plains FM 96.9

  Each Monday & Wednesday at 9.00 pm.
  Conservation, environment and peace with justice.
  This week: Michelia Ward, communications spokesperson for TradeAid on Fair Trade fortnight (May 2- 17). This year's theme: Protecting the environment through fair trade.
  Presenters: Martin and Lois Griffiths.
  NB: Listen again to Earthwise programmes on archive.

Coming up:

• Fair trade fortnight: 2 - 17 May.

  Background info here. (www.tradeaid.org.nz).
  
  

• Evening Class: Vegetarian & Vegan Meals.

  How to cook vegan meals without using animal derived ingredients & preparing baked goods without butter and eggs. Also covers food labelling & what to look out for when buying food for vegetarians and vegans.
  Tutor: Sabine Schneider.
  When: Starts 7.00 – 9.00 pm Tuesday, 5 May. (8 classes).
  Where: Cashmere High School.
  More info: here.
  

• Talk series: Work in the 21st century.

  Good for society or good for business?: Today workers in most of the globe are working longer, faster and harder, often for less. More here (item 8).
  Speaker: Dr Philip Ferguson, University of Canterbury.
  When: 7.00 - 8.30 pm starting Wednesday, 6 May. (4 weekly sessions).
  Where: CWEA, 59 Gloucester St.
  Cost: $20.00.
  Info/registration: CWEA or 366 0285.
  
  

• Climate change: Recent and predicted climate change in the Southern Hemisphere.

  Speaker: Dr Adrian McDonald, University of Canterbury.
  When: 7.00 pm Thursday, 7 May.
  Where: Venue on enrolment, University of Canterbury.
  Cost: $15.00.
  More info here.
  

• Presentations by secondary school students:

  (after week long education camp exploring waste): Tiromoana: There's no such place as away!
  When: 10.30 - 12.00 pm Friday, 8 May.
  Where: Our City - Otautahi, corner Worcester Boulevard & 0xford Tce.
  Background info here.
  
  

• Lincoln: Cooking with Attitude.

  Learn to cook a new meal each week; share information, interesting conversation & a meal together. The best social club in Lincoln!
  (Repeat series - due to popular demand).
  When: Starts 6.00 – 7.30 pm Thursday, 14 May. (10 classes).
  Where: Lincoln Primary School.
  Cost: $75.00 (includes meal).
  Contact/bookings: Cello 325 2156.
  
  

• NZ Climate Change Centre Conference 2009.

  Climate change adaptation - managing the unavoidable.
  When: 20 - 21 May.
  Where: Te Papa, Wellington.
  More info here. (www.sustainablecities.org.nz)
  Organised by NZ Climate Change Centre.
  

Reminders:

• Free home composting workshops:

  Hot composting of kitchen scraps & garden waste, Bokashi and worm farms. All methods demonstrated.
  At two sites:
  1. Opawa Community Gardens, 176 Opawa Rd (at Aynsley Tce). 1.00 - 2.30 pm each Saturday.
  2. Okeover Community Garden - University of Canterbury, Engineering Road. (Map here). 12.00 - 1.30 pm each Wednesday.
  More info/contact: Annmarie 021 190 4559 or 942 7190 (evenings).
  Supported by CCC.
  
  

• Nelson event: Small scale biogas and anaerobic digestion plants for house and farm.

  for those interested in constructing and operating a 'backyard' biogas plant.
  When: 7.00 pm Thursday, 30 April.
  Where: Maharishi Vedic Academy, 295 Wainui Rd, Silverdale.
  More info here. (www.transitiontowns.org.nz).
  
  

• NZ Oxfam's biggest coffee break 2009.

  Help struggling coffee growers out of poverty by organising a Coffee Break for your friends or workmates during Fairtrade Fortnight (May 2-17).
  Registration/more info: oxfam.org.nz/fair-trade.
  
  
• Support the Get Real campaign against free and profligate plastic bags usage in NZ. (1 billion bags a year).