Motu Economic and Public Policy Research

This project addresses the challenge of how to effectively and fairly provide incentives to enhance the regeneration of native forest in order to increase carbon storage and hence mitigate climate change. It focuses particularly on the challenges of engaging with landowners on multiply owned Maori land.

Project Summary

This project addresses the challenge of how to effectively and fairly provide incentives to enhance the regeneration of native forest in order to increase carbon storage and hence mitigate climate change. It focuses particularly on the challenges of engaging with landowners on multiply owned Maori land.

Project Description

Previous research suggests that there is significant potential for carbon sequestration through indigenous forest restoration on Maori land. The Permanent Forest Sink Initiative (PFSI) could provide resources to facilitate this restoration. The East Coast Forestry project could also provide some resources. Neither of these mechanisms may however be well suited to participation by Maori so may fall well short of their potential.

Maori communities on multiply-owned land in the East Cape do not face standard market conditions - they have limited access to markets, scarce capital, complex decision-making processes, and incomplete information. These conditions create barriers to efficient responses to opportunities and may require different contracting processes. Problems relating to rates payments on indigenous scrub land and to limitations on future land use options have also arisen in landowners’ relationships with regional and local councils and with the Department of Conservation. Therefore, we expect these lands to fall short of their potential under the Permanent Forest Sinks Initiative (PFSI)- unless we take steps toward overcoming these barriers. We are carrying out a pilot project involving payments for carbon sequestration through regeneration of indigenous forest on private land. Through this pilot we will identify and overcome barriers to participation. We are working with real landowners whose primary concern is economic and who face realistic constraints. By doing this, the lessons learned in the pilot will be applicable to a wide range of real situations - the people whose behaviour policy will ultimately be aiming to influence.

The pilot study will serve as a demonstration of how landowners can leverage future funding for sustainable land use - an outcome that can then be extended to the broader community of Maori in the East Cape and elsewhere as well as outside the Maori community. By identifying solutions to some of the problems that will inhibit effectiveness of the PFSI policy, we can expand its effectiveness, benefiting both landowners and New Zealand’s environment.

The work is primarily being carried out by Jason Funk, a graduate student from Stanford, as part of his PhD research. He is being supervised on the economics side by Suzi Kerr at Motu and on the ecological side by Troy Baisden, Garth Harmsworth and Craig Trotter at Landcare Research. He has spent three extended periods of time in New Zealand, mostly on the East Cape. During that time he has talked extensively with individual Maori landowners and trusts as well as central government officials who work on the PFSI and the East Coast Forestry Project, District council staff with concerns about erosion from marginal farm land and its effects on infrastructure; and Nga Whenua Rahui, who set up covenants to protect native forest on Maori land. These interactions have aimed to create an atmosphere of trust; teach Jason about Maori modes of interaction and the circumstances and decision making processes associated with Maori land owners; and begin the process of community learning about the potential and risks associated with carbon farming.

As a result of this work, the owners of two Maori landblocks signed contracts with Motu at a moving ceremony in East Cape in February 2007. By signing the contracts they agree to protect regenerating native forest and hence promote carbon sequestration in return for cash payments.

You can download and read anonymised copies of the kawenata (contracts). 

• Kawenata between XXXXXXXXXXXX, a Maori Incorporation under Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993 (called “the Landowner”) of the one part and Motu Economic and Public Policy Research Trust (called “Motu”). Download. (PDF, 54 KB)
• Kawenata between between XXXXXXXXXXXX, an Ahu Whenua Trust under Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993 (called “the Landowner”) of the one part and Motu Economic and Public Policy Research Trust (called “Motu”). Download. (PDF 68 KB)