Use the Categories list at the right to navigate to presentations, slides, and posters from all Sustainable Summits conferences. ==>

The New Zealand Alpine Club hosted the third global Sustainable Summits conference at Mount Cook, New Zealand, from 7 – 11 August 2016. The village is sited in Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park, part of Te Wahipounamou South Westland World Heritage Site. In 2016 the NZAC celebrated its 125th anniversary. Hosting the 3rd global Sustainable Summits Conference was a highlight of the club’s celebrations.

The core conference themes were:

Environmental Impacts: Human waste, water contamination, noise from helicopters and other machines, tracks and erosion, huts, bridges and tracks – visual impacts.

Natural Hazards: Large rockfall (e.g. South Face of Aoraki / Mount Cook 2014), ice recession and unstable geology, avalanches, adverse weather conditions, floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions.

Social Impacts / Cultural Values: Pressures on popular mountain routes – increasing numbers, out-of-season use of tracks, hut and track development; commercialism in the mountains; influences of social media; cultural awareness and visitor implications, Tōpuni areas (sacred), water protection.

The conference schedule is below. Click on the links to watch the talks and to view their slides.

A brief summary of the topics covered can be viewed on the UIAA website here.

Read a welcome from co-leaders here.

Day 1 (8 August 2016):

Ngāi Tahu, Tribal Elders and Sustainable Summits Leaders Pōwhiri – Welcome

Official opening
Senior Government representative DOC Director General
UIAA welcome video
NZAC President 

David Higgins
Sacred New Zealand Mountains

David Higgins currently resides at his home kāika (settlement) of Moeraki where he is the Ūpoko (Appointed Traditional Leader) for Moeraki. Following a lifetime involvement in advocating for Ngāi Tahu rights, David has recently retired as the Moeraki representative on the tribal council – Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu. David’s first involvement in tribal matters began as the Arowhenua Board member on the Ngāi Tahu Māori Trust Board who lodged the Ngāi Tahu Claim before the Waitangi Tribunal in 1986. During the proceedings of the Ngāi Tahu Claim, David was largely responsible for gathering and presenting much of the fisheries evidence that was presented to the Tribunal. In 2000 David was appointed as the Pou Kura Taiao for the Canterbury Conservancy of the Department of Conservation. David was one of the kaumātua established the Ngāi Tahu Cultural Mapping Project in the mid-2000s which is responsible for recording and mapping Ngāi Tahu knowledge on the tribal Geographical Information System (GIS).

Natural Hazards Session

This session focused on managing the impact of natural hazards on safety and access for mountain users.

Lou Sanson
Antarctica to the Southern Alps – an approach to sustainability

Lou Sanson was the Chief Executive of Antarctica New Zealand for seven years, responsible for developing, managing, and executing New Zealand’s activities in Antarctica and the Southern Ocean. During this period he was responsible for overseeing the deepest ever multi-national sedimentary science drilling project in Antarctica and a significant New Zealand investment in International Polar Year science (2007-2009). He also led the development of Antarctica’s largest wind turbine project focussing on reducing fossil fuels at McMurdo Station and Scott Base; carried out a major upgrade of facilities at Scott Base; placed a significant focus on outreach of the New Zealand Antarctic Programme and led the environmental, education and training coordinating groups at the Council of Managers of National Antarctic Program. He first worked in the Antarctic on glacial drilling and geohydrology projects for the New Zealand and United States Antarctic research programmes in the Dry Valleys in 1982/1983. He has also worked as a New Zealand government representative and as guest lecturer on Antarctic cruise ships, both in the Ross Sea and Antarctic Peninsula. Prior to this Lou was Conservator for Southland Conservancy in charge of Fiordland National Park, Stewart Island and the Subantarctic World Heritage Area. He also led the establishment of Rakiura National Park and some of the world’s largest island eradication projects and helped establish a network of marine reserves in Fiordland. A keen outdoor person, Lou enjoys natural history, hiking, ski-touring, diving and photography.

Simon Cox
New Zealand Mountains Falling Down

Dr Simon Cox is a Principal Scientist at GNS Science in Dunedin, with professional expertise in the fields of geological mapping and tectonics, GIS modelling and mineralisation. In 2010 he was awarded New Zealand’s premier geoscience prize, the MacKay Hammer, for his work on the Aoraki 1:250,000 geological map of the central South Island. He was also awarded the 2012 New Zealand Geophysics Prize and the 2011 New Zealand Hydrological Society best paper prize for his work on the hydrological effects of the Canterbury earthquakes. In 2012 he also published a geological map covering most of South Victoria Land, Antarctica. Simon graduated with a PhD from University of Otago in 1993, then developed consulting experience in the mineral industry throughout New Zealand, Indonesia and Australia. His exploration targeting at Macraes Flat in Otago led to the discovery and definition of the Frasers underground resource (1.2 Moz Au), which is still being mined. Simon currently sits in GNS Science’s Natural Hazards Division, where his work involves: fault and earthquake research in the South Island; the mapping of rock avalanches, earthquake-induced landslides and alluvial fan flooding hazards. He is also part of the Alpine Fault Drilling Project, has experiments to understand hot springs in the Southern Alps, and liquefaction damage in Christchurch. Away from work, it is likely that Simon and his family will be outside doing something active to “relax”. He is passionate about climbing, surfing, skiing, soccer and mountain biking. Simon has climbed and explored throughout the Southern Alps since a teenager, and has made expeditions to the Himalaya, Europe, America and Antarctica. Simon contributes to the community through Surf Lifesaving and peer review of science literature, maintains close ties with local iwi/māori through pounamu research, and is widely recognised as a public speaker and communicator of science.

Panel Discussion: Lou Sanson & Simon Cox

Don Bogie, Simon Cox, & Shirley Slatter
Field Visit ‐ Local Natural Hazards and Hermitage recycling

Olivier Moret & Pascal Mao
Mountain Sustainability Issues facing Mont Blanc

Olivier Moret leads the Petzl Foundation which supports or initiates not-for-profit projects which serve the public interest. A journalist by training, he worked for 15 years as the deputy editor-in-chief of Montagnes Magazine, the most popular mountaineering, hiking and climbing magazine in France. Particularly interested in the field of avalanche risk management, he co-authored Avalanches: How to Reduce the Risk, published in 2016 by Guerin Editions (Chamonix). Eager to share his passion for mountains and climbing, he’s also a professional mountain leader and a professional climbing instructor. He has climbed and skied many routes worldwide but always comes back to his first loves: the National Park of Ecrins and the Mont Blanc massif in France. Through the projects supported by the Petzl Foundation, Olivier hopes to contribute to a harmonious balance between human activities in the mountains and the vertical world relative to their impact on our natural, cultural and economic environments.

Pascal Mao is doctor in Geography and teacher – researcher at the Institute of Alpine Geography (Laboratory PACTE) of the University of Grenoble-Alpes. His work focuses on the questions of management and development of recreational and touristic territories. Its privileged study sites are the rural and mountain areas located as well in the Alps, the Mediterranean regions or North and South America. He questions himself on the dynamics of these territories via social or cultural entries and in term of public policies. He is director of the Cermosem, delocalized antenna of the University of Grenoble in Ardèche (southeast of France). He is also one of the coordinator of the network of researchers and experts in sports of mountain and nature [www.sportsnature.org]. He is moreover invested in the animation of activities linked to alpinism and climbing (lecturer, elected at the French federation of Mountain and Climbing, expeditions).

Brian Anderson
Retreating New Zealand Glaciers

Brian Anderson is a Senior Research Fellow at the Antarctic Research Centre, Victoria University of Wellington. Dr Anderson’s research uses knowledge of glacier dynamics, mass balance and glacier‐climate interactions, to complete mathematical modelling of glacier systems to investigate questions in paleo‐climate science and present day/future climate change. He has published widely in scientific journals on temperature changes and glacial fluctuations. To monitor the rapid change glaciers in the Southern Alps/Ka Tiritiri o te Moana, Brian and colleagues have installed timelapse cameras at four glaciers which take images every hour and are compiled into short movie clips, showing the flow of the ice and the rapid retreat of the glacier terminus.

Panel Discussion Q&A: Olivier Moret, Pascal Mao, Brian Anderson
Speakers and from the floor

Panel Discussion: “Commerce in the Mountains”
Panelists: Suze Kelly, Peter Rupitsch, Dawa Steven Sherpa, Robin McNeill, Erik Bradshaw, Geoff Gabites. Moderator Hugh Logan

Suze Kelly is General Manager of Adventure Consultants. Suze has a postgraduate science degree and she has been coordinating the office at AC headquarters since 1996. Suze was Everest Base Camp Manager on expeditions in 2000, 2006, 2007 and 2008. She has enjoyed climbing in New Zealand’s Southern Alps, Nepal, Thailand, Australia and the European Alps and spent ski seasons in North America and Europe. She has climbed Mt Kenya, Kilimanjaro (x2), Island Peak, Mt Cook, Mt Aspiring, Aconcagua, and also Lhotse in 2013. Most recently she attempted Mt Everest in 2015 and was at Camp 1 with the AC climbing team when the earthquake occurred on April 25. She then spent the next three weeks in Nepal helping to clean up at Base Camp and supporting the staff and families of the AC Sherpa team who were affected by the earthquake. She worked on fundraising and co‐ordination for our Sherpa Future Fund since returning to New Zealand. Suze is an active outdoors person, and when not in the office she’s off skiing, mountain biking, fishing, trekking and climbing.

Geoff Gabites Is CEO of Cycle Journeys and formerly CEO of Adventure South. Geoff has climbed and recreated in the mountains for fifty years in New Zealand, Australia, Nepal, China, Africa and South America. He has made a sustained contribution to administration of New Zealand Alpine Club as a previous President, and Chair of the Executive Committee. He received the 2015 Outdoors Volunteer award and Supreme award for his outstanding contributions to the outdoor sector in New Zealand.

Day 2 (9 August 2016): 

Environmental Impacts Session

This session focused on managing the human footprint in the wilds.

Dawa Steven Sherpa
The Everest Environmental Story
Listen to an interview with Dawa Steven Sherpa on Radio New Zealand here.

Dawa Steven Sherpa is a tourism entrepreneur and an environmental activist. He is an articulate and motivating speaker and was a key note speaker at the Sustainable Summits 2014, Golden, USA. Dawa has climbed Mt. Everest twice, as well as other 8000m peaks including Lhotse and Cho Oyu, and trekked the entire length of the Nepal Himalaya in 99 days over 1555km. Dawa also has the unique accolade of setting up the world’s highest Bakery at Everest Base Camp (5330m/ 17,500ft). Under Dawa Steven’s leadership, more than 150 climbers from 18 different nations have summited Mt. Everest. On these expeditions he pioneered environmental practices to make Himalayan expeditions cleaner, such as collecting 15,000 Kgs of garbage from the slopes of Mt. Everest. Dawa’s environmental and conservation work has been recognized and awarded by IUCN, WWF and International Olympic Committee, amongst others. He is a climate change ambassador for WWF and patron of the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award Nepal. He currently heads his family business that is focused on trekking tourism and mountaineering ( www.asian-trekking.com/)

Roger Robinson + video from Geoff Hill
The Denali Story – The Clean Climb Program

Roger Robinson first climbed Denali in 1975 as part of the Denali Rehabilitation and Education Project (DREP). The DREP initiated a new ethic in mountaineering and wilderness use. His climbs of Denali in ’75 and ’76 were clean-up efforts of the popular climbing routes. Accumulated litter left by climbers represented one of the worst examples of environmental degradation found in the national park system. In 1977, he assisted with raising money for a research project and education of climbers on Clean Climb practices for Denali and the Alaska Range. In 1980, he took employment as a climbing ranger for Denali National Park. This opened the door to incorporating his ideals for Clean Climbing and Leave No Trace principles into Denali’s evolving mountaineering program. In 1998, he began researching a methodical approach to remove garbage and human waste from the glaciers and mountains of the Park and in 2000 he tested the feasibility of removing all human waste from his 5-person 21-day climb. With the success of this experiment, he worked with the pack-out toilet industry, NPS Health Service, American Alpine Club (AAC) and Denali staff developing a portable toilet which became the Clean Mountain Can (CMC). In 2001, 2002 and 2003, with seed money from the AAC and Access Fund, CMCs were purchased to make it possible to voluntarily pack-out climbers’ waste safely. Over these first years the climbing community embraced the system as a standard and in 2007, full pack-out in designated areas of the Alaska Range went into regulation. Realizing there was a national and international lack in networking and continued increasing pollution by users in remote places, Roger organized and co-chaired the successful 2010 “Exit Strategies: Managing Human Waste in the Wild” conference hosted by the AAC in Golden, Colorado. Over 110 participants from 15 countries attended the conference. Roger has continued the dialogue that started at the Exit Strategies conference by maintaining a Google Group, “Managing Human Waste in the Wild”. Today, the Group collaborates with 120 like-minded experts and participants from all over the planet. In 2014, Roger continued his Clean Climb campaign as co-chair of “Sustainable Summits: Solutions to Preserve and Protect the World’s Mountain Regions” and now of the Sustainable Summits Initiative. Roger is a 40 year member of the American Alpine Club and the 1999 recipient of the distinguished AAC David Brower Conservation Award.

Panel Discussion: “Keeping the Mountains Clean”
Panelists: Dawa Steven Sherpa, Roger Robinson, Pascal Mao, Moderator: Stuart Gray

Stuart Gray began his career in public policy, but for the last 30 years he has been in the dairy industry, which until the recent climb in tourism was New Zealand’s largest foreign exchange earner. Since 2001 Stu has been a senior executive with the Fonterra Co-operative Group and is currently based in Christchurch as Regional Director for Co-op Affairs. Previous roles have included leadership positions in Australia and the Middle East. Stu has been an active climber and trans-alpine traveller around the world for 40 years and is a past President of the New Zealand Alpine Club. He sits on the Management Committee of the UIAA representing Oceania. Stu holds the M.A. degree in Geography from the University of Auckland, and wrote an early thesis looking at characteristics of visitors to the Waitakere Ranges on the edge of Auckland city.

Guy Cotter
Sustainable Practice – A guiding company’s role

Guy Cotter whole life has been spent in the mountains ‐ in New Zealand, the Himalayas and many other mountain ranges around the world. Born in southern New Zealand, he was introduced to the outdoors at an early age where a fascination for the mountains was fostered. His passion for the mountains eventually saw him focus on a career as a mountain guide where his skills earned him a position working alongside fellow Kiwis Rob Hall and Gary Ball when they established their Everest guiding company; Adventure Consultants in 1992. Guy excelled as a high altitude guide and, along with Rob and Gary, led the team to the summit that year on the first commercially guided expedition on Everest. After Rob Hall was lost in the tragic events on Everest in 1996, Guy purchased Adventure Consultants from Rob’s wife Jan becoming Director and CEO. In addition to guiding, Guy’s skills are in demand as a high altitude cameraman, running film projects in the Southern Alps (or on the Seven Summits), training corporate groups. For Guy, the pleasure of the adventure business lies not in the financial rewards but rather in helping clients achieve their dreams.

John Cocks & Tom Hopkins
Environmental impacts – waste

John Cocks is an environmental engineer and sustainability advocate whose lifelong passion has been mountaineering. As an engineer, John has lead significant infrastructure waste management projects, organised and facilitated workshops and training courses, and presented at conferences for over 20 years. A focus area has been solutions for managing human waste in the mountains. He is the current president of the New Zealand Alpine Club, which has a membership of over 3,300. He was convenor of the Club’s accommodation committee for 10 year, which oversees the management of the Club’s 16 mountain lodges and huts. He is co-chair of Sustainable Dunedin City Inc., a charitable entity (a position held since its inception in 2007), which successfully organised and ran a Resilience Summit in 2012 with 75 delegates. John co-presented a paper at Exit Strategies– Managing Human Waste in the Wild conference 2010 and attended the Sustainable Summits conference 2014, both in Golden, Colorado. He has climbed extensively throughout New Zealand, and overseas in the Himalayas, Karakorum, South America, Europe and Africa.

Tom Hopkins is a project manager with 18 years experience working for New Zealand’s Department of Conservation. He’s currently based in Hokitika on the South Island’s West Coast. He specialises in the delivery of recreation facilities projects including car parks, roads, walking tracks and cycle paths, bridges and public toilets. He is a Subject Matter Expert amongst his colleagues for on-site wastewater management in remote locations. He has also managed numerous backcountry hut upgrade and replacement projects, including Mueller and Plateau Huts in Aoraki Mt Cook National Park. His professional development includes an undergraduate degree in Parks and Recreation Management and a New Zealand Diploma in Engineering (Civil). Along with John Cocks of the New Zealand Alpine Club, he attended and presented at the American Alpine Club convened Exit Strategies Conference in Golden, Colorado in 2010. Attending this conference led to his participation in a six-month professional exchange with a civil engineer based out of the United States National Park Service’s Intermountain Regional Office in Lakewood, Colorado in 2012/13. In past lives Tom worked as a ski patroller and avalanche forecaster, as well as Field Support Officer for Antarctica New Zealand at New Zealand’s Scott Base. Tom is happiest riding his mountain bike, hiking, skiing, taking photographs, or simply just hanging out and taking in the view somewhere in New Zealand’s Southern Alps…preferably in the company of his kids.

Q&A: Speakers and from the floor

Karen Rollins
Sustainable accommodation

Karen Rollins is an environmental scientist and architectural technologist. She became involved with BEES through her volunteer work as Chair of the Alpine Club of Canada’s Energy, Water and Waste Management Committee. Karen is a business owner and consults in the field of indoor air quality and building envelopes. Affiliations include: distinguished lecturer for American Society of Heating Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers (2007-2011), member of the Canada Green Building Council, member of Alpine Club of Canada’s Environmental Working Group, and lecturer for the University of Calgary’s Continuing Education Environmental Management Certificate Program. Karen was a speaker at Sustainable Summits Conference in Golden, CO. (2014), Thinking Mountains Conference at the University of Alberta (2012), UIAA Conference on Hut Technologies in Bormio Italy (2010), and Exit Strategies Conference in Golden, CO. (2010). Karen lives in Canmore, Alberta, Canada and enjoys rock climbing.

Backcountry Energy Environmental Solutions (BEES) is a non-profit collaborative initiative formed to facilitate research, find solutions, and share information about energy, potable water, grey water, and black water at off-grid mountain facilities. Since 2005 BEES has been helping facility operators make choices that are functional, economical, culturally acceptable, and environmentally appropriate.

Derek Chinn
Huts – New Zealand context (Mid Tasman fly‐in hut)

Derek Chinn is a structural engineer based in Queenstown. His special area of interest is wind resistant timber and steel structures in inaccessible locations. Recently he has been involved with Tropical Cyclone Winston reconstruction on remote islands in Fiji. In New Zealand he has designed a variety of alpine buildings and structures. Huts designed include: Plateau, Mueller, French Ridge, Brewster, Albertburn Saddle, Mackinnon Pass and Pisa Range and a variety of ski area infrastructure. Derek has designed about a dozen toilets for alpine buildings to capture human waste and allow this to be flown out. Derek is a skilful mountaineer with ascents of some big walls in Yosemite, and several New Zealand mountaineering first ascents. His Himalayan adventures include the first ascent of the west buttress of Cholatse, a solo ascent of Pik Communism, the North Col north ridge of Mt Everest, narrowly missing the summit after climbing the Rupal Face of Nanga Parbat, and skiing off the summit of Mustag Atta. He has also enjoyed climbing in Peru, Alaska, Europe and the Atlas Mountains in North Africa. Derek is an active member of the Queenstown Alpine Cliff Rescue team, which involves a lot of leaping out of helicopters onto all sorts of surfaces in a variety of weather!

Day 3 (10 August 2016):

Social Values Session

This session focused on human expectations and adaptations.

Peter Rupitsch
People in the Austrian Alps

Peter Rupitsch is the managing director of Hohe Tauern National Park, the largest National Park in the European Alps. He started his career in 1984, shortly after the National Park was established and now is the longest serving National Park manager in Austria. Peter is member of various national and international conservation boards, such as Alparc (Alpine Network of Protected Areas) an National Parks Austria. He also is engaged as a lecturer at the Alpen-Adria-University Klagenfurt, Department of Geography and Regional Sciences. Peter has a deep relationship to mountains. His father, grandfather and uncle were well recognized mountain-guides in the Grossglockner Region. The family of his mother was operating Austria´s highest alpine refuge (Erzherzog Johann Hütte, 3.454m) for more than 30 years. As a former member of the Austrian Ski Team, Peter nowadays prefers ski touring in the Alps. There is a very strong historical link between the National Park and the Austrian Alpine Club (Oesterreichischer Alpenverein). As the Austrian Alpine Club is the biggest land-owner in the national park, including 42 alpine huts and some hundred kilometers of alpine trails, Peter Rupitsch permanently has to deal with issues like sustainable use of the landscape. The Alpine Club plays a key role in the park management. Based on a long-term partnership-agreement in the past 25 years a number of common projects have been realized to promote sustainable activities concerning visitor management, safety and mobility. This cooperation is known as a best practice example for conservation and sustainable tourism.

Dave Bamford
Global climbing pressures and management options

Dave Bamford (conference co‐coordinator) has a life centred around mountaineering, protected areas and sustainable tourism in developing countries and regions. He has climbed extensively in New Zealand. Ascents include all the 3,000 metre peaks in New Zealand (Aotearoa) including several first ascents. He has climbed overseas in the Himalaya, South America, Europe and Antarctica. From 1975 to 1986 Bamford worked in New Zealand’s National Park Service with a focus on visitor use at the time when New Zealand’s adventure tourism industry was emerging. He then established, with a colleague, a successful sustainable tourism consultancy, now called TRC Tourism. The firm, with Bamford involved with many of the assignments, has advised on tourism in over 40 countries. He has particular skills in business development. Dave is currently on advisory boards for three tourism businesses and is a member of the Board of Te Urewera, New Zealand’s first large protected area that is jointly governed by Tuhoe and Crown nominees. Dave is a past president of the New Zealand Alpine Club and has served on several regional and national conservation boards and committees. He attended Sustainable Summits 2014 in Golden, Colorado, and is a strong advocate for addressing mountain sustainability issues.

Lisa Choegyal
The Great Himalayan Trail

Lisa Choegyal has over 30 years experience in the tourism sector. Lisa is a specialist in planning, operating and marketing pro‐poor sustainable tourism (ecotourism). She has undertaken tourism consultancy roles in Australia, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Lao PDR, Nepal, New Zealand, Malaysia, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Sabah, Sarawak, Sri Lanka, Tibet, Vietnam and throughout the countries of the South Pacific including Fiji, French Polynesia, Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu. Lisa is a senior associate at TRC Tourism, and Honorary New Zealand Consul to Nepal.

Janet Mackay
Kosciuszko National Park

Janet Mackay is the owner and managing director of TRC Tourism a consultancy firm based in New Zealand and Australia and working across Asia and the Pacific. Janet specialises in destination planning, national park visitor management and planning and product development. Janet has lived and worked in the mountains for 35 years with the head office of her global business based in the Snowy Mountains in Australia. Before establishing her planning company Janet managed Kosciuszko National Park containing Australia’s highest peak, and was the program manager for the Australian Alps Cooperative management program which sees the alpine national parks of three states managed as one geographic unit. Janet is a keen skier, walker and mountain bike rider.

Panel Discussion – People & Management Options
Panelists: Janet Mackay, Roger Robinson, Lisa Choegyal, Moderator Sam Newton

Lisa Choegyal has over 30 years experience in the tourism sector. Lisa is a specialist in planning, operating and marketing pro‐poor sustainable tourism (ecotourism). She has undertaken tourism consultancy roles in Australia, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Lao PDR, Nepal, New Zealand, Malaysia, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Sabah, Sarawak, Sri Lanka, Tibet, Vietnam and throughout the countries of the South Pacific including Fiji, French Polynesia, Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu. Lisa is a senior associate at TRC Tourism, and Honorary New Zealand Consul to Nepal.

Sam Newton is the Outdoor Sector Advocacy Manager at the New Zealand Recreation Association. His previous roles include Parliamentary Advisor and General Manager of the New Zealand Alpine Club. He currently serves on the Canterbury Aoraki Conservation Board, the Board of the New Zealand Mountain Safety Council and is a Trustee of the Graeme Dingle Foundation. In 2015 he was awarded a fellowship by the Sir Winston Churchill Memorial Trust and undertook a study tour of the major Alpine Clubs of Europe and the UIAA.

Janet Mackay is the owner and managing director of TRC Tourism a consultancy firm based in New Zealand and Australia and working across Asia and the Pacific. Janet specialises in destination planning, national park visitor management and planning and product development. Janet has lived and worked in the mountains for 35 years with the head office of her global business based in the Snowy Mountains in Australia. Before establishing her planning company Janet managed Kosciuszko National Park containing Australia’s highest peak, and was the program manager for the Australian Alps Cooperative management program which sees the alpine national parks of three states managed as one geographic unit. Janet is a keen skier, walker and mountain bike rider.

Jamili Nais
Mt Kinabalu, Borneo – addressing social pressures

Dr Jamili Nais is currently the Director/CEO of the Sabah Parks Board. Jamili has been at the Sabah Parks service for 28 years and has assumed various positions: as the Parks Ecologist, then as the Interpretative and Education Officer at the renown Kinabalu Park, a World Heritage Site. He then became the Head of the Research Division, then the Deputy Director, before becoming the current Director/CEO, looking after all the terrestrial and Marine Parks in Sabah, Malaysia. Jamili obtained his B.Sc (Hons) in Botany from Malaysia National University and Ph.D in Plant Ecology from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. Jamili has more than 50 publications, mostly on plants ecology and park management, including five books, most notable being the award winning book “Rafflesia of the World.” More recently, Jamili successfull6y led the restoration work of the World Heritage Mount Kinabalu after the devastating earthquake on the 5th June 2015. Jamili was also instrumental in the gazettement of the Tun Mustapha Park on 19th May 2016. At almost one million hectares, this marine park on the northern part of Borneo is the largest park in Malaysia. Jamili is of the native Dusun tribe, an indigenous (or Momogun) tribe of Sabah in the Northern part of Borneo. He was born and grew up at the tropical rain forests on the foothills of mount Kinabalu.

Rob Brown
Wilderness values in the mountains

Rob Brown is a landscape photographer and writer based in Wanaka. Rob has been photographing New Zealand’s wild places from Northland to Stewart Island for over 20 years. Over the years he’s been to most of New Zealand’s wilderness areas as well as nearly all of the more visited National Parks and Conservation Areas. A passionate advocate for wilderness values, he was a member of the West Coast Conservation Board between 1998 and 2007 when the Paparoa and Adams Wilderness Areas were gazetted. He’s also had a long‐term commitment to the Federated Mountain Clubs of New Zealand doing two stints on the executive between 1997 and 2001 and between 2010 and 2015. In between those times he also did two years editing the FMC Bulletin. In a younger life he climbed throughout the Southern Alps, but these days prefers tramping through mountain country and looking at the higher peaks.

Eric Bradshaw
Access to the New Zealand Alps – a case study

Erik Bradshaw is managing director at IBIS Technology based in Queenstown. He is a recreational user of alpine areas around Queenstown, an enthusiastic climber, backcountry skier and adventurer. Erik has completed several notable mountaineering ascents and ski traverses. He has been central to protecting and promoting the public’s access to the mountain regions around his home of Queenstown through his leadership roles in the Federated Mountain Clubs, New Zealand Alpine Club, and local community organisations. To his surprise he has found younger outdoors people the most passionate and motivated about preserving and increasing access to these areas.

Q&A: Speakers Jamili Nais, Rob Brown & Erik Bradshaw and from the floor

Mike Davies
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park Plan

Mike Davies is the Operations Manager at Aoraki/Mount Cook District which covers Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park. He has been in the role since 2013 having previously worked in the Department of Conservation’s National Office as a Technical Advisor in the Recreation/Historic and Tourism Unit largely working on Visitor Risk Management. Mike started his working career working in the mineral exploration industry. After gaining a Diploma of Parks and Recreation Management in 1982, he has had over 20 years working in the conservation management area starting in 1983 as a Park Assistant with the Department of Lands and Survey at Taranaki/Egmont National Park. This period has included 3 years working as a Recreation Planner with the New Zealand Forest Service at Rimutaka Forest Park and over 17 years working for the Department of Conservation largely in the recreation management area in a variety of roles and locations. He has also spent 8 years of working outside of DOC as consultant in the graphic design industry and with the National Rural Fire Authority working in an emergency management role.

Harry Keys
Tongariro Alpine Crossing-where to from here?

The Tongariro Alpine Crossing is a very popular 20 km day hike over the Tongariro volcanic massif in Tongariro National Park World Heritage Area. The track was developed from the early 1900s for tourism purposes and the track network is now visited by well over 100,000 people annually growing at about 9% per year. This talk outlines who the people are, what they like and dislike, and the main management concerns and issues. Predictably these have included track and road maintenance, human waste disposal, crowding, safety and risk management, as well as protecting cultural values. Managing crowding and reducing risks to visitor safety are two of the longest running concerns. Given the economic benefits of the Crossing to local companies and tourism, and its huge growth in popularity, these two concerns are major and controversial challenges for the future.

Harry is a scientist with the New Zealand Department of Conservation involved in volcanic risk mitigation. His focus is the central North Island, which includes Tongariro National Park World Heritage Area, and particularly the Tongariro Alpine Crossing and Mt Ruapehu. He works with many agencies including GNS Science. In 2008 he was accorded a national honour, being made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to Conservation, especially for his leading role in the management of a controversial volcanic risk involving Mt Ruapehu’s Crater Lake. Harry is a former mountain guide, and a mountaineer, tramper and skier. He was made a Life Member of both the Taupo Ski Club (2012) and the Tongariro Natural History Society (2013), a local conservation organisation in the Tongariro/Taupo area. He also works in summer on tourist expedition ships to Antarctica as a lecturer and guide.

Richard Wesley
Leave No Trace: a 10-minute case study

Richard Wesley is the current chairperson of Leave No Trace New Zealand. He has had a long involvement with the New Zealand outdoors, and enjoys climbing, tramping, kayaking, skiing and mountain biking. Trained as an Electrical Engineer, his professional experience is varied: from beginnings as a professional design consultant, to overseas missions with Doctors Without Boarders (MSF) as a logistician in various parts of Africa, while currently now working with the horizontal infrastructure rebuild in Christchurch. He has also worked with the New Zealand Alpine Club as the Executive Officer for a number of years and remains closely involved with the NZAC. Richard has climbed and travelled extensively internationally and his adventures include first ascents in Pakistan, capturing endangered Vulture chicks on Indian cliff faces, and transalpine trips in South America, Kazakhstan and Alaska.

Robin McNeill
Role of volunteers: a 10-minute case study

Robin McNeill is a keen tramper and mountaineer and has a strong interest in management of public conservation lands. He was appointed to Southland Conservation Board 2003 – 2013, and was Federated Mountain Clubs President 2012‐2016. Robin has made major contributions to New Zealand backcountry literature as Editor of “Moir’s Guide South”, 6th and 7th editions, author of “Safety in the Mountains” 11th edition, and as highly popular contributor ‘Uncle Jacko’ in the FMC Bulletin. Robin has a strong background in remote and rural telecommunications and space ground segment engineering. He designed and built telecommunications networks in both of New Zealand’s remaining dependencies and New Zealand, between the Equator and the South Pole: Scott Base (78°S), Tokelau (8°S) and Milford Sound (45°S). He designed and built European Space Agency’s ATV down‐range station at Awarua, and expanded it to host a number of ground stations for LEOPs and satellite operations for a number of spaceflight operators.

Nima Namgyal Sherpa
Khumbu Climbing Centre: a 10-minute case study

Kristine Route
Human waste, norm activation theory, and changing human behavior in recreational settings

Hugh Logan & Roger Robinson
Summing up – What can we do? Where to from SS 2016?

Hugh is an active climber and ski mountaineer. Previously he has headed the New Zealand Antarctic programme, the Department of Conservation, and the Ministry for the Environment. He currently chairs a body known as the Land and Water Forum, a peak body advising the New Zealand government on freshwater management policy. In his student days Hugh worked at Aoraki Mt. Cook National Park as a park assistant. He has climbed and played through the mountain lands of New Zealand and is a advocate of handing them on to future generations preserved in their natural state so that, in the words of the New Zealand National Parks Act, “the public shall have freedom of entry and access to the parks, so that they may receive in full measure the inspiration, enjoyment, recreation, and other benefits”.

The Conference Organizing Committee consisted of Dave Bamford, John Cocks, Penny Brothers (NZAC President), John Nankervis (NZAC), Mike Davies (Department of Conservation), and Roger Robinson (2010 and 2014 Sustainable Summits Organizer, American Alpine Club).