Ecological Footprint Plus (EF+) 2003-2009

Much of New Zealand’s economic activity centres on value chains derived from land based activity-agriculture, horticulture and forestry. Minimising the input of material, energy and land into these rural-based industrial ecosystems, and their production of wastes, is a critical step towards making them (and therefore New Zealand) more sustainable.

This programme is compiling a detailed inventory of resource inputs and environmental pressures associated with food and fibre production in New Zealand. Sustainability indicators spanning environmental, social and economic dimensions and covering both the direct and indirect impacts of production are being developed within an input-output framework. These indicators will provide a better understanding of the sustainability of New Zealand's food and fibre sectors.

This analysis will help industry end-users to identify sustainability 'hot-spots' in relation to their own operations and those of their supply chains. It may also serve as input to more detailed studies of specific products or processes (e.g. Life Cycle Assessments). Some such studies are being carried out as part of the EF+ programme or by EF+ partners in related research projects. From a cross-sectoral or economy-wide perspective, our analysis may also help industry and government to understand the need for or the effects of policies aimed at reducing the environmental impacts of food and fibre production in New Zealand. Finally, the EF+ programme aims to generate understanding of the context, drivers and barriers to sustainable practices and for industries and the workers within them, and to use this “self” knowledge to analyse their own problems and generate innovative new solutions based on sustainability.

This research programme, which is administered by AgResearch (previously Canesis under FRST contract WROX0305), will be conducted on an inclusive and collaborative basis between the four main organisations (Massey/ESR/Scion/AgResearch).

1. Objective 1
   Integrative Analysis of Food-Fibre Value Chains
   Objective Leader: Dr James Lennox (NZCEE)
   
   
2. Objective 2
   Assessing the Human Drivers within Organisational Structures
   Objective Leader: Dr Jeff Foote (ESR)
   
   
3. Objective 3
   On-farm Meat and Wool Production
   Objective Leader: Dr Terry Reid (AgResearch)
   
   
4. Objective 4
   Post Farm Gate Wool Processing
   Objective Leader: Murray Taylor (AgResearch)
   
   
5. Objective 5
   Meat Processing Industry
   Objective Leader: Dr Margaret Leonard (ESR)
   
   
6. Objective 6
   Environmental Impacts of Forestry and Wood and Fibre Processing
   Objective Leader: Per Nielsen (Scion)
   
   
7. Objective 7
   Industrial Ecology of the Dairy Industry
   Objective Leader: Professor Don Cleland (Massey University)

This research is funded by the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology. In its initial stages, this programme focusses on the meat, wool, dairy and forestry on-farm and post-farm-gate value chains. Researchers who are already providing services and technology to those sectors will gather the data needed to paint a detailed and holistic picture of current material flows along the various value pipelines from land to product. This will highlight the “hotspots” that require priority attention.

Because the programme involves research organisations instrumental in developing new technologies and products, it will allow us to incorporate sustainability concepts at the inception of those technologies, and to focus research on the hotspots identified from the “footprint” analysis.

A further part of this programme concentrates on the effect of the human dimension on progress towards sustainability. What features exist within our organisational and cultural structures that promote or prohibit decisions and behavior that support sustainability? What prompts are required to encourage sustainability? What does sustainability mean to the various stakeholders in the value chains-to the manager of a company, to the farmer, to the bush-gang worker?

By engaging industry representatives in a process of consultation we will gain understanding of the structural changes necessary to promote sustainable criteria in industry and in individual everyday decisions.

Please contact James Lennox for further information.