Stories by Tracy Neal

An increasing number of storms will force more changes to forestry practices, a Nelson-based forest company says.

Young New Zealand and Australian explorers have returned from a voyage to Greenland that honoured a Norwegian explorer who made the first crossing of the interior in 1888.

The mayor of Buller District Council is refusing to say why its second chief executive has quit early.

Some tourism operators in the Abel Tasman National Park say visitors will be put off by a doubling of fees for huts and campsites, but that was not necessarily a bad thing.

Homelessness has nearly doubled in Nelson and a support service says the problem there is just as bad as in big cities.

Locals near Murchison who were forced to endure a digital detox for 10 days after a lightning strike knocked out cell phone and internet services are now back online.

A small craft brewery in Riwaka has seized one of the top prizes in a beer competition.

More than 50 households near Murchison in the Tasman District have been without cell phone reception or internet for more than a week.

A Nelson-based iwi says it has to keep growing pine forests in the Maitai Valley near Nelson, even though it wants some of the land for other things.

A former Marlborough farmer advocating for people still struggling from the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake says it will be years before the region fully recovers.

A formal complaint has been laid by Nelson's mayor after a councillor confronted colleagues over a decision to reduce funding for a zoo run by his wife.

A Nelson supermarket is stepping up the war on plastic by cutting it out completely in the fruit and vegetables aisles, bakery and the bulk bins.

The Marlborough District Council is set to resume pre-booking of burial plots in high-demand cemeteries.

Some jobseekers in the Tasman District would rather stay on the dole than pick apples.

A United States-based chemical engineer has rubbished claims that no safe alternative exists for fumigating export timber and logs.

A Nelson woman accused of rubbing rat poison on the face of MP Nick Smith has strongly denied the claim in the Nelson District Court.

More needs to be done to deal with severe horticultural labour shortages, which will only get worse, fruit growers in Tasman say.

A Nelson-based independent science research institute has denied claims it might have been linked to the transfer of an oyster-killing pathogen to Stewart Island.

A $63 million plan to put Marlborough's two main colleges on one site needs to go ahead, the district's mayor says.

Log and timber exporters could be able to over-ride a deadline for stricter controls around the use of the highly toxic fumigant, methyl bromide.

A Nelson teenager is leading the charge to keep what she says is a vital youth mental health service running 24 hours a day.

DOC has been told it has insufficient expertise to assess the risks to ships in the sub-Antarctic, after a ship it allowed into the Snares had its hull pierced after it hit a rock.

Migrants to Nelson-Tasman face widespread racial discrimination, language barriers that make it hard to get a job and living costs that act as a barrier to settling, a long-term study shows.

The road over the Takaka Hill is open again, but the road to recovery remains a long and windy one for some businesses.

Love them or - more frequently perhaps - hate them, but freedom campers are here to stay.