The Government’s $1.1billion "Jobs for Nature Fund" will not deliver hundreds of jobs for laid-off tourism workers in Otago and Southland, the Department of Conservation (Doc) says. The man leading the project for Doc’s Southern South Island region, Wakatipu operations manager Geoff Owen, said finding conservation work for such workers was an idea "easily said but not easily implemented". It had to be well-supervised, meet health and safety rules and deliver good conservation outcomes. Mr Owen said pilot projects were under way in the Wakatipu for wilding pine control, cycleway care and predator trapping. They were test cases for working out "how to best match the worker with the type of work required".

Source: Otago Daily Times June 23, 2020 16:30 UTC