After a two-year gap, it was fantastic to attend the Southland A&P Show over the weekend and to see so many families out enjoying the day.

With the primary industries being so crucial to the Southland economy, it was great to be part of an event bringing rural and urban communities together once again.

Liz Craig MP's stall at the 2023 Southland A&P Show.

The much-needed rain on the day was also a timely reminder of Southland’s vulnerability to severe weather events.

While the past few weeks have been very dry in many places across the South, the 2020 Mataura and Fiordland floods are still fresh in many people’s minds.

In this respect, it was good to see the recent outpouring of support from the Southland community for those impacted by the severe weather events in the North Island over the past few weeks. 

The Government has also made supporting those affected by these severe weather events a priority, with an initial $50 million support package for businesses, farmers and growers for urgent work like clearing silt and repairing infrastructure.

We’re also injecting an extra $250 million for emergency works to help councils fix roads, get transport links back up and access into communities. 

A new Cyclone Gabrielle Appeal Fund has also been set up to complement existing donation appeals, and to help ensure local and international donations are channelled to the communities and projects that need them the most.

This will also help provide funds to fix damaged facilities like sports clubs, marae and community halls.

You can find out more about the fund at: www.cycloneappeal.govt.nz 

However, with these events increasingly more likely due to climate change, we also need to ensure we build back better and with infrastructure that’s more resilient to severe weather events. 

Stead Street Stopbank.

In this respect, it was good to see Invercargill’s Stead Street Stopbank Upgrade completed last year with financial support from the Government, and work on the Waihōpai River Stopbank getting underway.

Other projects happening across the region include the Stead Street Pump Station Replacement and the Gore, Mataura and Wyndham Flood Protection Upgrades.

Co-funded by local councils and central Government, these projects will help protect Southern communities from flooding in future extreme weather events.

However, the thousands of people who marched through the streets last Friday calling for urgent action on climate change are a timely reminder we also need to continue accelerating our work to reduce our emissions.

The Government has already done a lot in this space including stopping the issuing of new permits for the offshore exploration for fossil fuels, introducing the Clean Car Discount to make it more affordable to buy low CO2 emission vehicles and co-funding over 1,300 electric vehicle chargers across the country. 

In Southland, a number of schools, as well as the Invercargill Prison have received funding to help replace or convert their coal boilers to run on clean energy alternatives. 

Similarly, the Government’s Investment in Decarbonising Industry Fund has co-funded a number of projects to help Southland businesses reduce their emissions, including at the Alliance Group’s plants at Lorneville and Mataura; at Blue Sky Meats, Prime Range Meats and AFFCO NZ Ltd in Invercargill; at Mataura Valley Milk in Gore and at Ravensdown Ltd in Southland.

However more work still needs to be done for us to meet our emission targets and given the importance of the primary industries to our economy, the Government is investing in further research to reduce our agricultural emissions.

This includes a new Centre for Climate Action on Agricultural Emissions, which will focus on reducing agricultural emissions through research and development, including a substantial new public private 50:50 joint venture. 

The Government has recently announced the Centre’s first investments.

Working with other partners, some of these projects include helping to increase our supply of low methane rams through genetic selection, thereby introducing more low methane traits into the national sheep flock; helping fund urgently needed greenhouse gas measurement equipment and infrastructure, so product developers can have greater access to testing equipment to prove the efficacy of new products; and helping fund further research on the effect plantain has on nitrous oxide emissions.  

While it may take some time for this evidence base to accumulate, in the meantime, the Government is committed to ensuring those communities impacted by the recent adverse weather events in the North Island can get back on their feet as soon as possible, and that we can build back better, so our communities are more resilient to future severe weather events.

All of us also have a role to play, and it’s been fantastic to see the way the Southland community has also stepped up, with donations and offers of assistance. 

Published by arrangement.