Adapting to natural hazards and the impacts of climate related disruptions is essential to protect our communities and ensure long-term resilience.
Tasman’s unique geography and landscapes, combined with our weather patterns, makes us vulnerable to a range of natural hazards. As climate change accelerates, weather-related natural hazards will increase in both frequency and intensity. From rising sea levels to more frequent extreme weather events, these changes present growing risks to people, property, infrastructure, and the natural environment.
Consideration of natural hazards and climate change effects has been embedded in the Council’s decision-making and work programmes for a number of years. Alongside our resource management and building consent processes, we are working on projects to enable infrastructure resiliency, catchment management and enhancement, and safeguarding key ecosystems. The Tasman Climate Change Response and Resilience Strategy sets out our actions that will benefit the community by focussing on adaptation and resilience to natural hazards and climate impacts, alongside mitigation actions.
Adaptation is not just about responding to immediate threats; it’s about ensuring long-term resilience and creating a sustainable future for everyone in our district. It involves adjusting our decision-making, policies and practices to reduce the long-term risks posed by natural hazards and climate change. This will ensure that communities can continue to thrive despite changing conditions.
By focussing on adaptation, along with preparedness and response actions, we can build more resilient communities, reduce the costs of natural hazard and climate related events, and ensure future generations inherit a safe and sustainable environment.
Between 2019 and 2022 Council initiated the ‘Coastal Management Project’ aiming to enable our Tasman Bay/Te Tai o Aorere and Golden Bay/Mohua communities to work towards long-term adaptive planning for sea level rise and coastal hazards. Early stages focussed on raising awareness and developing a common understanding about what we know about sea level rise and coastal hazards, and the high-level options that enable us to adapt. This work was guided by recommended good practice set out in the Ministry for the Environment’s Coastal Hazards and Climate Change Guidance 2017 (updated early 2024).
We are now refocussing this work in favour of an ‘all-natural hazards’ community adaptation approach. Future work will consider specific options for adapting to natural hazards and climate change at the local level. That work will look to consider the respective costs, benefits, and potential adverse effects of different options and to learn community preferences.
It’s important to note that current central government-led initiatives will have a significant influence on our future work programme. Our key legislation, the Resource Management Act 1991, is currently being reformed. In May 2024, the Government launched a cross-party inquiry to explore funding and responsibility-sharing of adapting to climate change. Led by the Finance and Expenditure Select Committee, the inquiry reported in October 2024 and more information on developing the adaptation framework is expected in early 2025. The work we have completed to date under the Coastal Management Project will stand us in good stead for responding to future central government direction.
Read more about development of the government’s climate adaptation framework. (external link)
We’re proposing Motueka to be our first community to work with at the local level on adaptation planning. Scoping is underway for a this long-term adaptation work. This will be a comprehensive plan that provides strategic direction for Motueka’s future over the longer term, bringing together planning, infrastructure and environmental opportunities, alongside options to respond to our natural hazards and sea level rise challenges. Further information on this work programme, including how to get involved, will be available in early 2025. This long-term adaption planning work will take several years to complete, and the community conversation will be ongoing.
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