One man’s cause — and effect

• Published date: 07 September 2023
• Publication title: Te Awamutu Courier

“There have been incremental improvements in the time I have been fishing in the Northern Tauranga harbour and any improvement is good,” says Donald who, while still actively involved in environmental projects, has stepped down as chairman of Project Parore

The health of the harbour and its fish has been the end game for Donald through decades of working with landowners and councils to improve the quality of waterways entering the harbour.

“I’m optimistic about the future especially here where the policies of the Bay of Plenty Regional and the Western Bay of Plenty District Councils have helped change attitudes and encouraged so much more native revegetation. Now the rest of New Zealand is catching up.”

Donald, who as a child helped his father clear a swamp for grazing land and had a stint as a scrub cutter, possum hunter and deer meat shooter, went on to become an ardent advocate for the environment, with the skill of getting landowners on side.

In his time as regional council senior environmental field officer, Donald oversaw around 180km of farm refencing to protect waterways.

“We averaged about 10km per year, but I have no idea about how many trees were planted as part of retirement schemes as the number was increasing all the time. The BOPRC ordered about 180,000 indigenous trees a year prior to my move to Taupo in 2008. Of those about 80,000 went to farmers I or my staff were working with.

“In the BOPRC Operational Plan, the ability to protect streams and bush has been a boon to the Western Bay of Plenty environment. This is a monetary incentive to protect parts of farms and people are the same regardless of their vocation. Money is always a great motivator.”

Donald was born and raised in Maramarua and attended Wesley College before taking a degree in Agricultural Science majoring in soils and geology at Massey University. He joined the Rangitiki/Wanganui Catchment Board working in Taihape hill country before heading to Darwin for a year working in land conservation.

He returned to New Zealand, took a job scrub cutting and married social worker Heather. “Heather wanted me to get a proper job when she was expecting our first child so, in 1980, I joined Hauraki Catchment Board working on the Waihou Valley Scheme.”

Its structured approach to river and flood management by looking at the total catchment impressed him.

“Fencing is a huge capital cost to farming and has little impact on profit. Grants from councils and large catchment schemes like the...