Kaipara District, located in the Northland Region in northern New Zealand, faces significant environmental challenges caused by changing climate and associated rising sea levels. For example, more intense and frequent drought, more extreme rainfall causing land instability and slips, increasingly severe cyclones, a 1% rise in average temperature by 2040, a 0.3m sea level rise in the next 24-40 years causing damage to all manner of property, 10-20 more heatwave days by 2040, and sea acidification.
Along with the changes there are also opportunities, which Kaipara District Council is acting on with the release of the Kaipara Ki Tua Climate Smart Strategic Framework.
Two approaches are laid out in the framework for the climate change mahi to come – mitigation and adaption. The first means reducing the greenhouse gas footprint by finding different ways of functioning as a Council and by encouraging carbon removal / sequestration. It means supporting and enabling community to do the same.
Adaptation is about increasing the Kaipara District’s resilience and ability to thrive in a changing environment. These approaches will be planned out in detail via the Climate Change Work Programme, which is mapped via three Council work streams including the Climate Smart Policy, Climate Action, and Adaptive Pathways Planning.
Read more:
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/AK2111/S00429/climate-change-action-plan-released.htm