Yesterday, Toitu Te Whenua Land Information New Zealand (Linz) announced a tenure review agreement had been reached for the high country station near Omarama, which has been farmed by the Innes family for many years.
About 12,250ha would become conservation land, which was significantly higher than the 9500ha proposed under the preliminary proposal. About 100ha would become private land owned by the leaseholder.
In a statement, Linz head of Crown property Sonya Wikitera said public feedback had been "carefully considered" and helped inform the decision to make more of the pastoral lease conservation land and improve public access to the area.
"The agreement will provide increased protection to these iconic landscapes, which include parts of the impressive Dunstan, Wether and St Bathans Ranges, and the special species that call them home.
"It will also improve access to these unique places and extend existing conservation areas for the public to enjoy for a range of recreational purposes," she said.
Linz thanked the leaseholder, whose family had farmed the land for more than 100 years, "in a way that’s preserved these significant inherent values".
"It’s a real credit to them," Ms Wikitera said.
Implementing the tenure review would take some time to allow for surveying of the land and to install fencing, she said.
While the Government made the decision to end tenure review in 2018, it was ongoing until changes to the Crown Pastoral Land Act came into effect.
At that point, only pastoral leases where a substantive proposal had been put to the leaseholder would be able to proceed.
The Bill is at the committee of the whole House stage of the legislative process, which involves detailed consideration of each clause (or part) of the Bill. There are 23 leases in tenure review at present.
Tenure review is a voluntary process that gives lessees an opportunity to buy some of their leasehold land from the Crown while the remainder returns to the Crown for conservation.
Dunstan Downs adjoined the Oteake Conservation Park and conservation areas resulting from tenure reviews at Killermont and Twin Peaks to the east.
To the west, it adjoined conservation areas arising from the Morven Hills tenure review and conservation covenants created from historic reviews in the Lindis Valley.
A summary of the submissions said, in general, they provided strong support for the proposed conservation areas.
Some submitters focused on perceived gaps in the tenure review process relating to the identification of significant inherent values (SIVs), assessment of ecological sustainability and justification of outcomes.
A small number of submitters raised generic issues about tenure review and perceived failings in the current process.
Those were matters for the Commissioner to consider in the context of the ongoing administration of tenure review, Linz said.
