We must learn how to work with nature, not against it. In all we do. Nature’s rebound is one of the upsides of the otherwise calamitous Covid-19 crisis. Atmosphere and waters cleared, the land quietened, and birds, fish and animals returned. When we took our foot off the neck of nature, she responded with renewed vigour and resilience. But we gave nature only a temporary reprieve while lockdown...
The New Zealand Institute of Economic Research has produced a next-to-useless report on our oil and gas sector. It is pure Past As Future (PAF), which is even worse than Business As Usual (BAU). It harkens back to the local sector’s glory days in the early 2000s when oil and gas production peaked and money for more exploration was ramping up. It takes no account of how dramatically the global oil...
The following article is an abridged version of Rod Oram’s essay in The Big Questions: What is New Zealand’s Future? The article was first published by Newsroom. Rod Oram is hopeful we can solve our paradox of being rich in natural capital, but being a poor performer economically and environmentally. He proposes a way forward. We wash away each year some 200 million tonnes of top soil, the...
This is an excerpt from Rod Oram’s new BWB Text, Three Cities: Seeking Hope in the Anthropocene. The text has been adapted for exclusive republication with Pure Advantage. With economies stagnating, politics polarising, societies shattering and ecosystems suffering, I felt an urgent need to go walkabout last September. It was my best chance of making some sense of the news from around the world...
Join our mailing list to receive the latest news and updates on Pure Advantage and New Zealand's Green Growth.