An airstrip built in a protected wetland area was granted consent retrospectively despite objections from Gisborne District Council's own ecologist and the Department of Conservation.
An East Cape pharmaceutical company has been fined $28,000 for planting in and taking water from a regionally-significant wetland without consent.
Tairāwhiti Pharmaceuticals planted 200,000 mānuka trees in late 2019, some of which encroached on Te Whare Wetlands.
Photo: Supplied/ LDR
Tairāwhiti Pharmaceuticals has been convicted of modifying and taking water from Te Whare Wetlands in breach of the Resource Management Act after Gisborne District Council laid charges.
In sentencing at Gisborne District Court yesterday, Judge Brian Dwyer said he believed Tairāwhiti Pharmaceuticals director Mark Kerr genuinely didn t know he was planting 3.1 hectares of mānuka through a protected area.