FIELD                        AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY AND FISHERIES

 

Review of Forest Health Surveillanceunit standards

 

Subfield	Domain	Id
Forestry	Forest Health Surveillance	5872, 5875

 

The Forest Industries Training and Education Council (FITEC) has completed the review of the unit standards listed above.

 

Date new versions published                        July 2006

 

Planned review date                        December 2008

 

Summary of review and consultation process

 

FITEC’s Biosecurity Sector Standards Body comprising representatives of industry and providers, at a meeting held in November 2005, decided to review:

 

·        Unit 5872 Assess forest health in plantation forests on the ground, because of changes made by the Forest Owners Association to the procedures for the surveillance of plantation forest health.

 

·        Unit 5875 Assess tree health in the urban forest environment, because of changes made by Biosecurity New Zealand to the procedures for the surveillance of tree health in urban areas.

 

In the process of reviewing the unit standards it was decided that the changes were of such magnitude that the unit standards should be designated expiring and new ones developed.  Review Groups approved the new unit standards in January 2006.

 

Main changes resulting from the review

 

Unit standard 22894 developed.  The main changes made to the procedures for surveillance of tree health in the urban forest environment (formerly covered by unit standard 5875) include:

·        Arborescent vegetation and herbaceous vegetation

·        Inclusion of ‘wooden material’ in the inspection

·        Inspection based on permanent transects

·        The use of the Global Positioning System (GPS)

·        A ‘transect vegetation description’ for each transect

·        A unique alphanumeric code for each transect

·        Inspection focused on vegetation within a defined boundary of ports, transitional facilities, and other identified high risk sites.

 

Unit standard 22895 developed. The main changes made to the procedures for the assessment (surveillance) of plantation forest health (formerly covered by unit standard 5872) include:

·        Viewpoint monitoring

·        The use of the Global Positioning System (GPS)

·        The use of bounded transects

·        Investigative surveillance, and random surveillance

·        The requirement to record the location of surveillance plots

·        Intensive surveillance around identified risk sites.

 

Unit standards categorised as category D expire at the end of December 2007

 

Impact on existing provider accreditations

 

None.

 

Impact on Accreditation and Moderation Action Plan (AMAP)

 

None.

 

Impact on existing qualifications

 

The following Forest Health Surveillance qualification is affected by the outcome of this review and will be revised in 2006 to reflect the outcome of this review

 

Qualification title	Classification or standard in the qualification
National Certificate in Forest Health Surveillance (Level 5) [Ref: 0909]	5872, 5875

 

Summary of main changes

 

All changes are in bold.

 

Key to review category
A	Dates changed, but no other changes are made - the new version of the standard carries the same Id and a new version number
B	Changes made, but the overall outcome remains the same - the new version of the standard carries the same Id and a new version number
C	Major changes that necessitate the registration of a replacement standard with a new Id
D	Standard will expire and not be replaced

 

Subfield            Forestry

Domain            Forest Health Surveillance

Id	Title	Level	Credit	Review Category
5872	Assess forest health in plantation forests on the ground	5	4	D
5875	Assess tree health in the urban forest environment	5	8	D
22894	Carry out high risk site surveillance in the urban forest environment	5	12	New
22895	Assess the health of forest plantations from the ground	5	10	New