Individual Environmental Action or Leadership Award

Passionate about native flora and fauna, John Whitehead has dedicated more than 30 years of his life to improving our region’s environment. His love of the environment came from studying at Massey University and being a part of its Alpine Club. He remains invested in the area, a member of Nga Tamariki a Tane Society Inc, which owns a block of land in the Ruahine Range in the Manawatu.

A member of the Waiau Working Party since 1990, he was a part of consent negotiations around the power scheme. John has also been a trustee of the Waiau Fisheries and Wildlife Habitat Enhancement Trust since its inception in 1997 and chair of the Pomona Island Charitable Trust since its inception in 2005.

Most recently, he has been a member of the Southland Conservation Board from 2011 until retirement this year and in his spare time – he farmed in the Te Anau basin for 40 years. John’s passion for biodiversity saw him put in place the first QEII covenant in the basin. Pomona Island, though, is what John describes as his biggest challenge, sometimes spending 20 hours per week completing trust work. The judges described John as someone who gets in and gets the work done, and who has developed in the leadership space over time. “John has made an outstanding individual contribution to Southland’s biodiversity over a long period of time.”