Chair Andi Cockroft comments here are based on key themes from the Government’s “Our Environment 2025″ reporting and is written for CORANZ members from a recreation-focused perspective.
An environment in decline — and why recreationists should care
Imagine a dawn tramp once filled with birdsong now carrying only silence. A favourite swim-hole fringed with warning signs. A stream that once ran clear now clouded or choked with slime. These are not isolated anecdotes. They are symptoms of a deeper, documented trend — and this time, the warning is not coming from a “green lobby”, but from the New Zealand Government’s own environmental reporting. Link https://environment.govt.nz/assets/publications/our-environment-2025.pdf
“Our Environment 2025,” produced by the Ministry for the Environment and Stats NZ, paints one of the most comprehensive — and confronting — pictures we’ve ever had of the state of land, water and biodiversity in Aotearoa. For anyone who fishes, hunts, tramps, paddles or simply seeks solace in the outdoors, this is not just an environmental story. It is a recreation story.
The data is clear: many of the natural systems that outdoor planning, access and enjoyment depend on are under sustained and increasing pressure.
“Code red” for native species
Among the most disturbing findings is the status of native wildlife.
Huge proportions of New Zealand’s native species are now threatened or at risk of extinction:
- Around 93% of native frog species
- Roughly 94% of native reptile species
- Large numbers of native birds, freshwater fish and invertebrates
For recreationists, this is not just a scientific statistic. It is something witnessed on the ground. Many long-time trampers speak of quieter forests and fewer sightings. Hunters notice ecological imbalances, especially where food chains have broken down. Anglers report changes in fish populations and water quality.
A healthy ecosystem is not just about rare species in a report — it underpins the very experiences that draw people into the outdoors in the first place.
Freshwater warning signs for swimmers and anglers
Freshwater health is given particular attention in the 2025 reporting, and not in a good way.
The report highlights ongoing and, in some places, worsening problems with:
- E. coli contamination in rivers, lakes and groundwater
- Elevated nutrient levels (including nitrates)
- Continued loss and degradation of wetlands
These are not abstract laboratory issues. E. coli levels are directly tied to contact recreation safety — how safe it is to swim, kayak, wade or let children and dogs enter the water.
It is sobering that almost half of monitored groundwater sites show breaches of drinking-water standards for E. coli at least once. Many rivers show little improvement, and in some cases a trend of decline.
For recreationists, rivers and lakes are not just resources — they are places of connection, memory, spiritual value and tradition. Every warning sign placed on a riverbank represents not only an ecological failure but also a lost opportunity for safe enjoyment.
Wetlands, too, continue to disappear or degrade. These areas are essential filters for water quality and provide habitat for species that form part of the wider outdoor ecological fabric. When wetlands go, downstream systems suffer — and so do recreation values.
Measuring decline — but where is the turning point?
New Zealand has now produced multiple environmental reports over more than a decade. Each has refined the data, improved monitoring, and expanded the scope of analysis. That in itself is positive.
But there is an uncomfortable pattern: the graphs mostly keep moving in the wrong direction.
The country is getting better at measuring environmental decline — but much slower at reversing it.
For those who spend large parts of their lives outdoors, this raises a fair question:
Are we just becoming world-class at documenting problems, while allowing the causes to continue?
The reporting makes it clear that land use choices, water management decisions and ongoing pressures on ecosystems are all major contributors to the state we now find ourselves in. Yet at the same time, large-scale development, intensification and environmental trade-offs continue to be approved.
This is where the gap between “reporting” and “action” becomes particularly relevant for CORANZ members.
Outdoor recreation — not just a victim, but part of the solution
It would be wrong to cast outdoor recreation purely as a casualty in this story. In many cases, it is also part of the solution.
Across the country:
- Volunteers restore riverbanks and wetlands
- Tramping and hunting clubs help maintain remote tracks and huts
- Care groups protect local waterways and estuaries
- Recreational users act as the eyes and ears of the landscape
Outdoor people are often the first to notice changes — the loss of fish, the spread of weeds, the silencing of birds, the degradation of streams. This lived, on-the-ground knowledge is a powerful, and often under-used, resource.
If included effectively, recreation communities could play a far larger role in environmental decision-making, restoration efforts and long-term stewardship.
Rather than being seen purely as “users,” outdoor groups could be recognised as partners in protection.
What CORANZ and the outdoor community can reasonably demand
Without turning this into a political or ideological argument, the data in Our Environment 2025 supports several practical, common-sense positions that recreation groups can get behind:
- Water quality standards that genuinely prioritise safe contact recreation
- Strong protection of headwaters, wetlands and catchments that feed major rivers and lakes
- Recognition of outdoor recreation areas as national assets, not expendable margins
- Proper inclusion of recreation voices in local and national environmental planning
- Greater transparency between environmental reporting and actual decision-making
None of this is radical. All of it is consistent with what the Government’s own data is telling us.
If these places matter to future generations, then the people who use and love them today deserve a stronger seat at the table.
A final thought: when the data meets lived experience
For many CORANZ members, the decline of certain rivers, forests or coastlines has not come as a surprise. It has been seen slowly, season by season, over decades.
What Our Environment 2025 does is remove any remaining doubt. The evidence is now in the official record.
The real question is not whether the environment is changing.
It is whether we are willing to change how we treat it — before silence, warning signs and loss become the new normal for outdoor New Zealand.