Budget for environmental research data ‘heartening’

Commissioner for the environment welcomes funding to plug gaps in New Zealand research data

New Zealand’s commissioner for the environment has said that he is “heartened” by a NZ$25 million allocation in the federal budget to help plug “data gaps” in environmental research.

Commissioner Simon Upton said it represented “real progress” on serious issues identified in his report on the state of environmental research, which he labelled “fragmented”. That report, published in December, said: “No single agency is responsible for ensuring that our investment in environmental research spans the range of knowledge gaps that need to be filled.”