Queen’s Birthday honour for conservation stalwart

 

BY ROB POOLEY

Trustee of Project Crimson for 27 years, conservationist, a member of the esteemed Mangawhai trackies and all round good guy Gordon Hosking has been recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours with the Officer of New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) being bestowed upon him for services to conservation.

In 1989, while working for the Forest Research Institute, Gordon began an investigation into the health of the Mainland Pohutukawa and was dismayed to find more than 90 percent of coastal pohutukawa stands were dead or dying, having succumbed to pastoral farming, possums and fire. In conjunction with the Department of Conservation and Carter Holt Harvey a community-based project to rescue the tree was established, becoming the Project Crimson Trust.

It was during positions with the Forest Research Institute/Scion Forest Health Group and the Ministry of Forestry that Hosking established his own technology company to advance new initiatives in environmentally acceptable quarantine treatments. He designed an indigenous forest health assessment package, delivered in a joint venture with Scion making significant contributions to the organisation’s efforts to protect pohutukawa, rata, and other native trees.

He has personally planted thousands of trees at Project Crimson events and has contributed to the Trust’s environmental education initiatives, including Living Legends and Trees That Count projects. Under his watch more than 170,000 native trees were planted to commemorate New Zealand’s hosting of the 2011 Rugby World Cup and Trees That Count encouraged New Zealanders to plant millions more native trees to mitigate climate change and is always willing to impart his knowledge to anyone interested.

Locally, Hosking is a Trustee of the Mangawhai Walking Weekend, The Mangawhai Tracks Charitable Trust and, out of concern for our harbour has been part of the water quality sampling programme at Mangawhai Harbour in helping officials better understand the importance of this essential asset.
His achievements during his career as a scientist and conservation leader are unquestionably worthy of this honour. Locals are united in their congratulations and in saying “thank you Gordon for all of the volunteer projects you lead in our community, making a difference and appreciated by an entire community.”

Queen’s Birthday Honours recipient Gordon Hosking (centre) pictured with members of a volunteer Mangawhai water testing team early last year.