On Monday the Initiative launched From Red Tape to Green Gold, our second report on the mineral estate in New Zealand and the regulations that constrain it, specifically the Resource Management Act.

The report makes three recommendations.

First, that central government introduce financial incentives for councils to better enable them to manage complicated and highly technical mining consents.

Second, we critically need central government to play its RMA-mandated role and produce national policy guidance on mining, outstanding national landscapes, and ecological compensation schemes.

Lastly, the report calls on government to modernise the RMA, noting that the regulation and its processes lag international best practice by about 20 years.

The aim is to encourage goldilocks projects that respect the environment and make sustained contributions to the local and national economy. It is a frustrating paradox that communities in rural New Zealand face increasing economic hardship, all the while standing on significant mineral wealth.

Presented to a packed out event at our Wellington offices, the report triggered one of the most heated Q&A sessions yet at one of these sessions.

Environmentalists, ministry officials, mining lobbyists, economists and Initiative regulars thrashed out their views of pollution, climate change, green tape and the viability of mining ventures in the current commodity cycle.

What was more remarkable was that there was appeared a lot of common ground (although some, like Forest and Bird, remained intractable) and this is an extremely encouraging thing.

These included the need for government to develop a clear methodology to identify outstanding national landscapes, a robust ecological compensation framework, and to modernise how our resource and planning legislation works.

This is a great place to start. After all, if the rules are clear and efficient, the environmental protections high, and the mining activity respectful, what rational basis is there to object to efforts to increase mining activity in rural areas? 

Having a mechanism that sorts the rational from the irrational is how we start to have a considered conversation on resource use, economic development and the environment in New Zealand.

With the hard work that went into producing the report complete, the real challenge starts in earnest. We need to spread these ideas and areas of common ground to a wider audience. We need to shift the terms of the debate from “mining or the environment” to “mining and the environment”.