Monday, 14 December 2020, 4:10 pm
Back in in the late 1960s, some forward thinking people
in Marlborough’s then local government bodies thought it
would be a good idea to plant pine trees on large tracts of
unproductive land to promote soil stabilisation and to
generate funding from logging.
In 1995 revenue from
logging started to be realised, taking financial pressure
off the region’s ratepayers and generating funds for a
wide range of community facilities and projects.
That
original vision has reaped enormous rewards for the
Marlborough region, said Councillor Gerald Hope, who chairs
the Marlborough Regional Forestry Joint
Committee.
“Marlborough was lucky to have had
Monday, 14 December, 2020 - 16:15
Back in in the late 1960s, some forward thinking people in Marlborough’s then local government bodies thought it would be a good idea to plant pine trees on large tracts of unproductive land to promote soil stabilisation and to generate funding from logging.
In 1995 revenue from logging started to be realised, taking financial pressure off the region’s ratepayers and generating funds for a wide range of community facilities and projects.
That original vision has reaped enormous rewards for the Marlborough region, said Councillor Gerald Hope, who chairs the Marlborough Regional Forestry Joint Committee. Marlborough was lucky to have had forward thinkers such as Mayor Sid Harling who chaired the Marlborough Local Bodies Forestry Committee from May 1968. The committee’s arguments were persuasive but they had to jump through many hoops to get the idea off the ground. There were councillors to persuade on the four Marlborough councils and