How to become a famous blogger

So we have reached the end of the road.  Time has run out for this blog and its blogger and whilst this might be a relief for some(!), it also an opportunity for some reflection, some insight and some helpful hints for any who follow in the footsteps of the ERST 633 Class of '11.

Whilst I've tried to maintain the cheesy travelogue theme as far as possible, there's not much "travelly" about feedback. So I've prepared a simple guidebook page on what to expect in the world of blogging, and (most importantly) what not to expect.  It also contains some analysis in ways to generate some more comments and interest in IEM blogging.. No holiday snaps this time, I couldn't find any to match!

Fame and fortune

One option

A lot of bloggers go into the bloggersphere in the hope of finding fame..and fortune..and immortality. But unfortunately, unless you are picked up by some Fairfax/APN webpage there is little to be gained in celebrity from blogging.  

And of course, the topic/theme/raving lunacy you pick to blog about will have a huge impact on the number of followers you get.  In this case, the theme of the blog was set (IEM, integrated environmental management) as well as the range of content of a certain number of these entries (3 were designated "theory", 5-8 as "IEM in current affairs" and 1 being the feedback you're reading now).  However, this does not mean that there is not a great amount of flexibility in what each post contains. Use your imagination, think outside the IEM box/matrix - and draw from your own experience.  I know Alicia impressed us all with her seemingly unlikely use of the "coloured hats" that many had to sit through in primary school.  But actually, in an environmental management context, it doesn't sound so naff after all! There is merit and usefulness in de Bono's theories, beyond that of getting kids to work together in the classroom.  Good stuff Alicia.

Don't be shy - learn from others

Work with the rest of the class - it's not a competition. Don't be shy about sharing your blogs early on.  The input of fellow ERST 633ers is invaluable, not to mention they are great proof readers! Thanks to Lara, I figured out that I can't just copy and paste pictures into my blog, I have to go through the process of uploading them, otherwise they end up as nasty red crosses, and the blog suffers from overtextualisation.  Something that no one wants to see in a blog, a presentation or even a report.  Which brings me to another point - pictures, pictures, pictures!!!  Relevant or not, they will help break up the barren wasteland that can be an IEM theory blog post - as well as hitting home some of your more salient points (signposting anyone?)  If you want people to stay interested in your post beyond the first line, it pays to give their eyes something to look forward to, not to mention it'll give your blog some nice padding!!

Blogs take time

Really - you shouldn't have..

Blog on time! Make it a weekly routine. In a world where people followed my blog, this would be important to keep them entertained. However, this advice is purely practical - blogs take time.  You can't leave them all until the last week (which I didn't thankfully, but I know the stress that others have been through!) Even if you aren't writing a blog post each week, at least be on the look out for likely blog topics. Keep a list, note down ideas, it will make things much easier when you are able to find the time to make the post. There's nothing worse than trying to make a blog post out of nothing.. If things get tricky, go for something pithy. Don't slave away at paragraph after paragraph - you won't be able to change the [IEM] world if your readers are asleep at the start line.  Make it short and sweet and insightful, rather than dull and lacking substance.. (I should be careful what I say here, something about stones and glasshouses comes to mind!)

When all else fails, sell your soul

I thought that I might gain some more followers (and maybe actually earn some money) by signing up with Google Adsense ("take advantage of AdSense For Feeds to increase your blog's potential").  However, to date, I have earned a grand total of 82 cents. Needless to say I'm not waiting for the cheque in the mail.  

This experience did provide some entertainment however, including some rather unusual advertisements (a man in his boxer shorts does not make me think NZ Army, not sure which demographic they were going for there..).  You may even find some interesting ads as you read this blog post.

And that, my friends, is the last you'll hear from me! Until next time.

How can IEM respond to an environmental disaster?

I had hoped to incorporate a more international flavour in today’s post (thanks to Lara for that inspiration), but I just can’t get past the unfolding environmental disaster in the Bay of Plenty that has been dominating the news for the past week.

The beginning of the oil leak (it has increased substantially in the subsequent bad weather)



Showing the crack in the ship's hull
 (Wednesday 12 October)



In case you’re not aware of the crisis, it began when the 47,000 tonne, 236m cargo ship “Rena” ran aground on the Astrolabe reef in the early hours of October 5th. Quite how this happened, and who is responsible, is not yet clear, and it is even less clear how long the oil leaking from the ship will continue. As I finish this post, the ship has not yet broken in two, although it has lost about 70 containers and is predicted to break up in today’s heavy seas.



A dead yellow-eyed penguin



Meanwhile, hundreds of tonnes of thick, toxic fuel oil* has leaked from the ships ruptured fuel tanks, with an estimated 1700 tonnes still onboard. To date, dozens of seabirds and an unknown number of fish and other sea life has succumbed to the oil sludge, that is now covering Mount Maunganui, Maketu and Papamoa beaches.

Papamoa Beach



So how could an IEM approach be used to prevent this crisis happening? Well, let’s start with some problem definition.  There are a number of ways to look at the issue:

1) Failings by Maritime New Zealand to prevent the ship leaving Bluff on 28 September, where their inspections allegedly showed inaccurate navigation charts. Problem: insufficient authority, expertise or resources for Maritime NZ.

2) The ship’s crew are alleged to have been celebrating the Captain’s 44th birthday on the night the ship ran aground. Problem: culture of drinking on large cargo ships.

3) The ship’s operator is Costamare Inc, parent company of the ship’s owner, Daina Shipping Co., but the ship has been chartered by the Mediterranean Shipping Company. Problem: difficult to find out who is responsible for the ship.

4) The Government response to both the stranding and the subsequent oil leakage was perceived by many to be too slow, with authorities ill-equipped to deal with a disaster of this magnitude. Problem: under resourcing of maritime disaster response units, lack of co-ordination and leadership between authorities.

The list could go on and on. The point being that, in a situation such as this, one that New Zealand has never had to deal with, the definition of the problem may go a long way to ensure that such a disaster never happens again, or at least not to the same degree as the Rena stranding.



This appeared last week on a shipping
crate at Papamoa



Another aspect of IEM worth considering is how community based environmental management (CBEM) could help with the cleanup of the beaches. Many locals are becoming increasingly angry with authorities for the delay in co-ordinating a cleanup response, but more importantly, for keeping locals away from the beaches, and preventing their involvement in the cleanup efforts. Whilst there are issues surrounding the toxicity of the oil, as well as the best methods for removing it from the beaches so as not to make the environmental impact worse, there seems to have been very little in the way of collaboration between authorities and locals. This seems absurd when you consider the size of the job, as well as the number of willing helpers. Gaining some social capital at the outset could go a long way in the Government’s favour if the situation worsens (as it is likely to do). Only today am I seeing messages on the NZ Herald website, requesting volunteers to help. Could this not have been done sooner? Would the Government have gained some much needed brownie points? And would the environmental effects of the oil have been mitigated by a quicker response?



Maritime NZ Salvage Unit Manager Bruce Anderson,
Environment Minister Nick Smith, Transport Minister
Steven Joyce and National On Scene Commander
Nick Quinn at the press conference at Tauranga
Boys’ College on Tuesday afternoon.



This discussion leads me to consider how better institutional integration might have either prevented this disaster, or at least reduced the impact it is now having on the Bay of Plenty environment, by allowing a quicker response to the ship’s stranding last week. It seems now that the oil leak and likely disintegration of the vessel was inevitable. Such is the value of hindsight. But did the authorities really believe this would happen last week? At the time, the weather was fine, so no attempt was made to remove the containers from the ship (arguably due to lack of proper equipment) or to empty the fuel tanks of oil (also due to equipment, although the barge had only to come from Auckland). Lack of public information on how to safely clean up the beaches, and officials telling people to stay away, has led to public hostility against those in charge. Could better co-ordination between Maritime New Zealand, the Government Ministries (Ministry for the Environment and Ministry of Transport) and conservation groups have helped with the salvage and oil cleanup efforts, if not with public perception?  It also might have helped if the proper equipment was closer to hand – should New Zealand have its own floating crane to remove containers in future? This would not seem excessive in a country so reliant on cargo ships to move freight. The ship itself was not an oil tanker (perish the thought!) and there are thousands of cargo vessels navigating our harbours every year.

Whilst I cannot begin to solve all the questions raised in this post, I think it is appropriate that an IEM approach be considered as a way forward from this situation. It might not have all the answers, and the series of circumstance giving rise to the disaster may never happen again, but there are certainly aspects of IEM that can be drawn on to help manage the recovery, and possibly prevent future catastrophes.

Fuel oil

 

*Fuel oil used aboard ships is known as “bunker fuel”, a name derived from the storage of coal in bunkers for when ships were powered by steam. The only things more dense than bunker fuel are carbon black feedstock and bituminous residue which is used for paving roads (asphalt) and sealing roofs (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_oil#Bunker_fuel)

Ki uta ki tai – IEM ki te ao Māori?

Taumutu Marae

On the 25^th August 2011, Ngati Moki hosted for the first time in its history, a Government Minister at its Taumutu Marae. 

Dr Nick Smith, the Minister of the Environment visited the marae to mark the signing of Whakaora Te Waihora, a long term relationship agreement and shared commitment between Ngāi Tahu, Te Waihora Management Board and Environment Canterbury.

One of the dual purposes of this agreement is to:

“provide for sustainable management of natural and physical resources, and the realisation of outcomes aimed at the restoration and rejuvenation of Te Waihora, including the cultural, biodiversity, mahinga kai, economic, and recreational values. This includes the outstanding values relating to habitat for wildlife, indigenous vegetation and fish and significance in accordance with tikanga Ngāi Tahu in respect of Ngāi Tahu history, mahinga kai and the customary fishery. This will be delivered for Te Waihora and its catchment through a framework driven by Ki Uta Ki Tai / integrated management of the catchment which recognises and provides for the practical and meaningful exercise of the respective statutory and kaitiakitanga responsibilities of the Parties.” [emphasis added]

Whilst a blog (and probably an essay) could be written about the IEM implications within the first part of that clause, for the time being I am more interested in investigating further the expression “ki uta ki tai”.

In the interpretation section of the agreement, it is defined as:

“a Ngāi Tahu paradigm and ethic and is the Ngāi Tahu way of understanding the natural environment, including how it functions, how people relate to it and how it can be looked after appropriately. It is the concept used to describe the overall approach to natural resource management by Ngāi Tahu - from the mountains to the sea.”

Quite literally, it means “from the mountains to the sea”, but I was curious to find out what this means in actual environmental management practice, and how close it is to an integrated approach to environmental management.

This led me to Ngāi Tahu’s 2025 vision document, in particular the Te Ao Tūroa (natural environment) section. This vision was prepared in 2000 and contains goals for the iwi, and “where their whānau, hapū and iwi would be in 25 years time, what they would look like and what the world would look like”

Te Runanga o Ngāi Tahu logo

Under te ao turoa, Ngāi Tahu has a number of 5 year and 5 to 25 year goals, including to develop a generic ‘Ki Uta Ki Tai’ iwi environmental management plan (within 5 years), and to develop ‘Ki Uta Ki Tai’ environmental management plans for Papatipu Rūnanga (the ancestral tribes) (5–25 years).

As a means to achieving this first goal, in 2002/2003 Ngāi Tahu’s Kaupapa Taiao (“environment policy") developed a draft scoping document for the Ki Uta Ki Tai concept, including ways it can be implemented to achieve the aspirations for our natural environment as outlined in Ngāi Tahu 2025.

From this document, the following local Papatipu Rūnanga Ki Uta Ki Tai Plans (“iwi management plans”) have been developed, including:

• Te Taumutu Rūnanga Natural Resource Management Plan 2003;

• Kāi Tahu Ki Otago Natural Resource Plan 2005;

• Kaikōura Rūnanga Natural Resource Management Plan 2005 (second edition 2007); and

• Te Rūnanga o Makaawhio Kaitiakitaka Pounamu (Pounamu Resource Management Plan) 2009.

So, how do these plans reflect the principles of IEM?

On closer inspection of the Kaikōura Plan (2^nd edition), it is possible to see a substantial amount of the Bührs' IEM Matrix within the plan’s contents page alone. (I won't go further than the contents page, given the document is 339 pages long!)

Selected components of Kaikōura Rūnanga Natural Resource Management Plan	Corresponding Bührs IEM matrix / IEM principle component
Part 1: Introduction
“Relationship with other plans and policy”	Integration with other policies/plans
“Outcomes” Kaitiakitanga and Treaty-related outcomes; Environmental outcomes; and Social, economic, health and well-being outcomes.	A broad, holistic view of “environment”, includes consideration of components of the triple bottom line (plus culture!)
Part 2: Kaitiakitanga
“Legislative frame work”	A further integration of policy, sets out connections with existing legislation.
“Kaitiakitanga: Values and principles”	Integration of knowledge, interpretation, analysis.
Part 3: Policy
“Atmosphere and Air”	The first component of a wide interpretation of “environment”. The following sections include this wide interpretation, adopting a catchment based approach to environmental management.
“Awatere”	Integrates the land-related environmental components of the Awatere River catchment and surrounds, for example: mountains (Tapuae o Uenuku), forestry, vineyards, freshwater, riparian planting, salt extraction, mahinga kai, biodiversity, river banks, hazardous substances/new organisms.
“Waiau Toa”	The Clarence River catchment gets a similar integrated management approach as the Awatere River catchment. This section also includes consideration of high country matters (tenure, access), and transport matters.
“Te Ahi Kaikōura a Tama ki te Rangi”	Again, an integrated, “catchment” based approach to management of the local Kaikōura region, including the township. Covers matters such as residential subdivision, business, tourism, farming, sewage disposal, gravel extraction.
“Okarahia ki te Hurunui”	The Hurunui catchment (includes Tūtae Putaputa, Waiau and Hurunui rivers). Matters such as forestry, limestone mining, Hanmer Springs, water extraction and minimum flows.
“Te Tai o Marokura”	The coastal marine area of Kaikōura: from Te Parinui o Whiti to the Hurunui River and out to the open sea. Includes issues such as coastal land use and development, coastal protection, activities in the CMA, fisheries, marine mammals, marine birds, offshore petroleum extraction.
“Wahi Tapu”	Significant treasures and sacred places. The final component of the broad interpretation of “environment”.
Part 4: Implementing the plan
“Effective partnerships”	Institutional integration of Ngati Kuri with regional/territorial authorities and other organisations, where “effective partnership” involves communication and collaboration.
“Implementation tools and methods”	No single “solution” advocated – a variety of tools that are flexible and adaptable.

 

From the mountains..

Whilst that is a very brief summary of the content of the plan, it seems to me that it embodies both literally, and strategically, the “mountains to the sea” philosophy of “ki uta ki tai”. I will be interested to follow how such management plans are now implemented, and how the notion of ki uta ki tai can contribute to an integrated approach to environmental management.

Inland Kaikoura (view from Mount Fyffe)

..to the sea