Climate change

What coal mining is to Australia, what oil extraction and Saudi Aramco is to Saudi Arabia – that’s what intensive dairying and Fonterra is to New Zealand.

Fonterra alone produced almost a fifth of New Zealand’s total greenhouse gas emissions in 2023.

Too many dairy cattle produce a quarter of the country’s climate warming greenhouse gas emissions. Most of these emissions are the superheating gas methane. Just one tonne of methane has the same impact on climate change as 265 tonnes of carbon dioxide.

Reducing the number of cattle is the single most effective contribution New Zealand can make in the face of the climate crisis. This action works towards the goal of keeping within the global warming target of no more than 1.5 degrees. It can mean the difference we make to avoiding the next climate domino from falling. 

Real climate action will mean the Government regulates to reduce the size of the dairy herd. The Government must phase out synthetic nitrogen fertiliser and supplementary feeds like PKE.

Our climate, our health, communities, and planet, cannot survive unless we drastically reduce plastic production.

Yet not only do the plastics and packaging industry want plastic production to triple by 2050, but so does the oil industry. This is because 99% of plastic is made from oil and gas.

Corporate giants urgently need to reduce plastic production by at least 75% (by 2040) to limit global overheating. This can play a role to prevent the increasingly dangerous and irreversible impacts of the climate crisis.

A strong Global Plastics Treaty will keep oil in the ground and ensure a just and safe transition built on reuse and refill solutions.

We have a once-in-a-generation challenge. To stop another extractive industry – deep sea mining – from harming the global oceans the way the fossil fuel companies have done to our global atmosphere.

The deep sea is an incredibly important store of ‘blue carbon’, the carbon that is naturally absorbed by marine life. Blue carbon remains stored in deep sea sediment for thousands of years after these creatures die – helping to balance the climate.

But by impacting on natural processes that store carbon, mining the deep sea floor could make the climate crisis even worse. The disruption caused by the machines may release carbon stored in deep sea sediments.

The ocean is home to a huge variety of wildlife on this planet. It stabilises the climate, provides food security for billions of people and is spiritually and culturally significant to tangata whenua and Tagata o’le moana (the people of the Pacific). 

Oceans play a significant role in regulating Earth’s climate by absorbing and storing carbon dioxide. Ocean sanctuaries help sequester carbon and reduce the impact of climate change.

Critical habitats like mangroves, seagrass beds, and coral reefs act as carbon sinks. Protecting these vast stores of blue carbon can slow climate change.

The oil industry’s drive for continued extraction of fossil fuels puts all at risk. Over years a movement of iwi, Greenpeace and hundreds of thousands of people led to the end of new offshore oil and gas exploration in 2017.

The National-led Government wants to bring back new offshore oil and gas exploration. But if the oil industry thinks anything will be any easier than last time they were here, they’re wrong. We will never allow offshore oil and gas exploration to recommence in Aotearoa.