A Beef + Lamb study that showed sheep and beef farming has greater community benefits than forestry, underestimated impact of losing farmland, he said.
The research by BakerAg found if all 189 sheep and beef farms covering 132,000ha in Wairoa District were converted to forestry, 700 local jobs would be lost, the equivalent of one job in five, and the local economy would each year have $23.5m less money spent in it.
Little says his district is still the focus of companies looking to blanket plant exotic forests and it needs the protection of Government legislation.
Earlier this month the Government released a national policy statement for urban development, It requires councils to do a full analysis of alternatives, benefits and costs when considering urban expansion onto highly productive land used for growing food, vegetables and primary production.
The BakerAg report for B+LNZ reveals in the last two years seven Wairoa farms covering 8486ha have been sold for forestry conversion despite a sharp rise in the district-wide average price.
In 2017 the average price of land in the district was $5212 a hectare but it rose sharply to $9465 in 2018 before easing to $7355 this year.
From 2015 to 2017 there were no sales of farms for forestry conversion.
The Labour-led Government has introduced two policies critics say unfairly favour forestry.
The Billion Trees scheme provides taxpayer incentives for planting trees though it is weighted towards natives and changes to the Overseas Investment Act lowered the legislative barrier forestry companies must meet to invest in NZ while lifting it for foreigners looking at other investments.
Forestry Minister Shane Jones says he is hearing the concerns of communities like Wairoa.
“That’s why we are committed to reviewing the impact of the change to the Overseas Investment Office regime.
“Currently, there have been too few cases through the process under the new approach to draw any useful conclusions.
“Te Uru Rakau (Forestry NZ) is also looking closely at the impact of different types of afforestation on rural communities.
“Our overall approach as a Government has been to help farming businesses integrate forestry into their existing operations.”
Little believes the estimated 700 jobs lost should the district become forestry is too light, given the scale of downstream consequences on jobs.
“If all the farms go to trees then we might as well close up Wairoa because there will nothing here.”
He believes productive sheep and beef farmland needs protection.
“It beggars me why, when I have spoken to Government officials and Ministry for Primary Industry officials, we can’t protect productive farmland which is aligned with the Paris Accord which says we should not threaten food production.
“We can’t eat trees.”
Little says the owner of a farm that sold in the district recently accepted a lower price from a fellow farmer than was offered by a forestry company to prevent the land from being planted in trees.
“He deserves a medal that guy.”
B+LNZ chief insight officer Jeremy Baker says the report shows the impact of poorly designed policy allowing fossil fuel emitters unfettered access to land for trees to offset their emissions.
“This report illustrates the huge risks of unintended consequences from poorly designed policy and emissions targets, which will incentivise a high level of afforestation and result in a devastating impact on rural communities,” he says.
Forestry jobs come at the end of the growing cycle while the carbon credit benefits for investors using trees to offset their emissions go to landowners, usually outside the district, not to the local rural community.
