She was speaking at the Federated Farmers High Country Industry Group Conference in Wanaka.
In answer to a question, Ms van der Goes said there had been a "huge shift" in conservation thinking over the past 20 years away from the "very traditional preservationist" to a much wider acceptance of conservation land being used for recreation and other purposes.
She outlined the "streamlining" occurring within the department and suggested it was taking a "more sophisticated" approach to conservation.
She hoped that would involve more work with other groups.
Three new positions had been created in Otago: a business development manager, a community support manager and an iwi support person.
Their jobs would be to work with those groups to "get more people to work with us in conservation," Ms van der Goes said.
"So the idea is we will work towards doubling the amount of conservation work that is done but we will be doing it in partnership with others."
Ms van der Goes said the department had less money but would be "doing work differently to compensate for that."
The "new model" begins on July 1.
Ms van der Goes said activities high country farmers were involved in, such as cutting down wilding pines and shooting goats, were expensive programmes and she considered everyone would get the best "bang for their buck" by working together.
Several farmers were concerned about the department's approach to burn-offs.
Ms van der Goes said following the "considerable damage" done to conservation land near Wanaka by an "escaped" burn-off last season, there would be a "more robust" approach to issuing fire permits.
One requirement would be to have more fire-fighting capacity on hand in case of "fire escape".
Acting group chairman Jim Ward, of Molesworth Station, said the "take-home" message for Ms van der Goes was for the department to give the wilding pine problem top priority so future generations were not faced with "a massive pine forest".
