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The tiny Central Otago township of Tarras has fought off wind farms, wilding pine, and an international airport. Now, locals are rallying against plans for an opencast gold mine in their backyard. Mike Thorpe reports.

If you’ve never heard of Tarras, you’ve probably never driven through the Lindis Pass. It is a tiny town within a vast, barren  landscape, brown on brown with hints of tan and beige, littered with taupe tussock.

It’s one of the driest areas in New Zealand - and picturesque; the sort of beauty befitting of a priceless  landscape painting.

But Tarras is more than a backdrop of stunning nothingness. The township and surrounding areas are a beacon for big business ventures. Really big.

And the locals don’t usually like them.

Just how many locals there are seems to be a contentious point. It may be as few as 230 (as reported by RNZ in 2023) or as many as 606 (2018 Census). The Tarras school roll in 2024 was 20. None of those numbers add up.

In any case, they have a habit of making a noise far louder than the sum of their parts – and they’re not afraid to stand up for themselves or others.

Vocal locals have taken the wind out of numerous big ideas – in one instance, literally.

The proposed Project Hayes wind farm was planned for the Lammermoor Range in Middlemarch – a long way east of Tarras. Locals opposed from Tarras and nearby St Bathans - Sir Grahame Sydney included. Central Otago sticks together.

“No,” they said - “Not there. Not in their backyard.”

The environment court agreed and Sir Grahame’s paintings remained mostly turbineless.

Recently Tarras itself was the object of Christchurch Airport’s desire. The  there that could do all the business that Queenstown Airport couldn’t. The resort town’s location is arguably New Zealand’s most scenic – but its limitless beauty can only be seen by a limited number of international visitors because of the limits of its runway. It can’t get any longer. The flat land around Tarras could solve that issue.

Plans for the now-paused Tarras airport.

It’s a short drive to Queenstown.

Christchurch International Airport Limited (CIAL) were serious enough to invest at least $45 million on the project. CIAL bought 750ha of farmland in Tarras in 2020 – enough land to build a large-scale airport capable of supporting flights to Australia, the South Pacific and Southeast Asia. It would also boast a runway measuring more than 2km - possibly long enough to accommodate the world’s largest passenger plane (Airbus A380) carrying Tarras’ entire population – whatever that might be.

“No,” said Tarras. “Not here. Not in my backyard.”

CIAL has since  – they still own the farm.

Locals were vocal in their opposition to the airport plans.

The latest plan is arguably even less palatable for the people of Tarras and Central Otago. Among the area’s brown, beige, tan and taupe hills another colour has been found – gold.

Santana Minerals believe it to be the most significant gold deposit found in New Zealand for several decades. Called the Bendigo-Ophir Project, it is situated between the two towns with a particular focus on the Rise and Shine Valley in the Dunstan Mountains, behind Tarras. There’s wealth in the hills. It’s a familiar tale.

A brief and repetitive history

According to details on Santana’s website – the area looked very different before people arrived. Mountain totara, silver beech, celery pine forests, kōwhai and kānuka scrubland covered the ranges. The thought of that is a far cry from the brown and barren scenery that’s being fought over now.

“With the arrival of people there were profound vegetation changes resulting from fires lit by hunter-gatherers, subsequent pastoral grazing and the arrival of introduced species,” it reads.

The area is understood to have been an important hunting ground for Ngai Tahu.

When Europeans arrived, Tarras became an agricultural community with fertile land and ideal conditions for merino sheep farming. The breed still prospers in the region today – though the prosperity of its fleece fluctuates like Central Otago temperatures.

During the Otago gold rush of the 1860s, Tarras was an important stopover point for fortune seekers due to its proximity to the Lindis Pass.

As the gold rush slowed to a dawdle, Tarras returned to its roots – and there it has stayed.

Tarras is a rugged, rural spot in Central Otago. Photo / ��һ�ǿ�����

The dry-as-an-old-chip environment underwent further man-made change when an irrigation scheme was introduced. Green was the new gold.

Misinformation and missing information

In opposition to Santana Minerals – and CIAL before them, is Sustainable Tarras. They are a group of concerned residents who make it their business to take big business to task. They are the David to industry goliaths.

They’d sooner champion suitable local business – but needs must.

They recently released two short video clips detailing the dangers of the Bendigo Ophir Project – and they didn’t hold back.

The video shows what looks like the catastrophic failure of toxic dams from gold mines around the world.

“It may only take a few successive earthquakes, a massive rain event, an accident, the collapse of a dam or human error and cyanide can enter our aquafers or be washed downstream,” the narrator says.

“I think what they put out there was misleading, focusing on the extreme end of that industry,” says Santana Minerals executive director and chief executive Damian Spring.

Damian Spring, executive director and CEO of Santana Minerals.

The dams in the video are suggested to be tailings dams. They store waste from mining operations.

“You’ve got to look at the facts about how tailings [dams] have been managed in New Zealand over the last 50, 60 years. And there are very few if any real issues out there, nothing that compares to what they put on that video,” says Spring.

As for the likelihood of a natural disaster causing an environmental one, Spring points to rigorous design and construction standards that his engineers must meet.

For example – they must consider the potential for the Alpine Fault to rupture.

“The AF8 [Alpine Fault Magnitude 8] is a 1-in-330-year event as per their website. These engineers and the New Zealand Large Dam Society guidelines require them to design to a 1-in-10,000-year event,” says Spring.

As much as Spring claims misinformation on the part of Sustainable Tarras, the residents’ group says there is crucial information missing from the public domain. Information that Spring and Santana Minerals have.

“They reported to the Australian Stock Exchange that they had completed all their reports at the end of last year. So we’ve asked for those reports and we haven’t seen them,” says Sustainable Tarras spokeswoman Suze Keith.

Suze Keith, spokeswoman for Sustainable Tarras.

Keith says what they have been provided is incomplete.

“Any sort of financial data associated with that application was redacted, so, it’s very difficult for us to be able to fully understand the benefit to the local economy and also the cost to the local economy.”

The numbers

There’s an estimated $11 billion worth of the gold “in the ground”. It could be more by the time they start extracting it – depending on the gold price at the time.

It currently sits at just over NZ$5000 per ounce.

“We acquired Matakanui Gold [Limited] that made the initial discovery of 200,000 ounces in 2020 and since then the discovery has proven to be exceptional. We’ve just released an updated mineral resource estimate showing a total discovery of 2.3 million ounces,” says Spring.

Critics of the project say that money will head offshore. Santana Minerals is an Australian company, after all. Spring says a portion will leave New Zealand – but the majority will remain here.

“Our New Zealand company is Matakanui Gold. The profits generated here will pay corporate tax of 28% like any other New Zealand company.”

He says they’ll also face a further 10% in tax due to the quality of the minerals they’re extracting.

“It’s called ‘accounting profits tax’ under the Crown Minerals Act. So, in effect we’ll be paying 38% corporate tax rate,” says Spring.

He believes there is a possibility that a portion of that extra 10% will go directly back into the region from which the resource came, but that’s up to the Government.

So that’s 38 cents in the dollar going straight to central government – but Spring says, with some assumptions, that a significant amount of after-tax profit will also remain in New Zealand.

The Dunstan mountains as presented on the Santana Minerals website. Photo / Simon Williams, Santana Minerals

“Once we do get into production, with the around about up to 40% shareholding that is New Zealand based, 40% of the after-tax profits has the potential to stay in New Zealand anyway,” says Spring.

“So overall, we’re sort of sitting around the range of 60% of the gross profits will remain in New Zealand.”

The mine would also bring about significant job opportunities.

“We’re talking over 300 jobs. And of course, people who have a primary industry job generate demands on services - and the mine itself will generate demands on services that create a number of indirect jobs. So, it’s about 300 direct jobs and over 400 indirect jobs,” says Spring.

Suze Keith says that level of growth – on top of an already healthy growth rate, could exacerbate existing issues.

“Central Otago is one of the fastest growing areas in the country. It’s grown on average 3.2% annually for the last five years compared to 1.4% nationally. It’s got a 1.5% unemployment rate – so, this is an economy that’s actually doing really well,” says Keith.

But she says the region is “struggling to keep up” in terms of infrastructure, housing and health services.

“We’re concerned that such a large actor coming into the economy is potentially going to have more negative consequences than positive ones,” says Keith.

Spring argues that there may not be the influx that Keith thinks.

“There’s an expectation that a large part of our workforce are already here,” says Spring – pointing to the fact that only three of his current team of 21 came from outside the region.

Still, he acknowledges that accommodation is an ongoing battle – and one they plan to mitigate.

“As part of our application, a construction camp where construction workers will be able to stay there whilst they work,” he says.

‘This huge dirty scar’

The Sustainable Tarras clip details the proximity of the mine to the flight path into Queenstown – giving tourists “a bird’s eye view of this huge dirty scar on the Central Otago landscape”.

They have a point. Gold mines, unlike Central Otago’s mountainous scenery, aren’t known for their eye-catching beauty. Granted, the remnants of the last gold rush are now cute tourist attractions – but the Bendigo-Ophir Project probably doesn’t have that in its future.

Oceana Gold Macraes mine in Otago. Its life has been extended through until 2028. Photo / Grant Bradley

“I think Santana, you know, can easily be compared to Macraes mine because what they’re proposing is of a similar scale,” says Keith.

That’s not quite right – according to Spring.

“It’s a maximum of 550 hectares. I believe that Macraes is several thousand hectares of area, so we’re a long way off from being the size of Macraes,” he says.

The life cycle would also be well short of Macraes. Mining at the Otago site began in 1989 and its life has been extended until 2028.

The full cycle of the Bendigo-Ophir Project would be roughly a third of that, says Spring.

“It’s a nine-year mine life. That’s what we know at this point in time. That’s operations, producing gold. Obviously there’s a construction period of about two years and of course closure. There’s a bit of a tail of at least a couple of years of earth moving and rehabilitation,” says Spring.

If they could start digging a hole in 2026, they might have it filled by 2040.

The fast track

These are the words that strike fear into the hearts of most conservationists. It is simultaneously celebrated by those who feel the Resource Management Act hasn’t been so much of a judder bar as it has been a roadblock.

The Fast-track Approvals Act – continuing that analogy and going by Spring’s explanation, isn’t so much an autobahn for industries like his, as it is a pit lane.

“The Resource Management Act is still in play, the fast-track doesn’t sidestep that.”

It just provides a one-stop shop where the effects that are addressed under the RMA are put together with the other permits that we need under the Wildlife Act, Heritage Act and examined by the expert panel,” says Spring.

It will also be examined by Sustainable Tarras at that time.

“Because of the way that Santana has chosen not to release any of the reports that they’ve commissioned, we’re having to kind of second guess that in the meantime,” says Keith.

The Dunstan Mountains could be home to a large gold mine between Bendigo and Ophir. Photo / Simon Williams, Santana Minerals

Spring says he understands that the community has many questions.

“If there was a gold mine opening up near my town, I’d be asking a series of questions to make sure that I’m comfortable and that they can do the job that I expect them to do,” says Spring.

Keith finds some irony in that response.

“So why isn’t he helping answer them?” she asks.

It’s easy to identify Keith and Sustainable Tarras – and many others across Central Otago as ‘nimbys’. The acronym for ‘Not In My Back Yard’ is defined as; A person who objects to the  of something perceived as  or hazardous in the area where they live, especially while raising no such  to similar developments elsewhere.

Keith says that’s not what she or they are.

“We were significant contributors to the Tarras community plan, which is a document which lays out the local community’s vision for the future of Tarras and the Bendigo area,” she says.

“Neither an international airport nor a series of open cast gold mining pits are aligned with that.”

That’ll be decided later this year. Spring says Santana Minerals are on track to submit their application next month – and could have consents granted by the third quarter of 2025.

Keith and Sustainable Tarras will do their best to pump the brakes on the fast-track process – and they continue to rally support from the community.

Gold mines are part of Central Otago's past, and Santana Minerals are working towards making them part of its future.

“We see that mining is incompatible with the existing economy, and we’re super concerned about the implications of such a large and risky sector coming into Central Otago,” says Keith.

This is an argument that has played out before – and with mining in New Zealand now very much back in the spotlight, it won’t be the last.

“This Government’s done industry great favours, obviously, but it’s not at the expense of the environment. I think those people who are throwing rocks at the fact that the environment will pay for this activity - don’t understand our industry,” says Spring.

“I’m really looking forward to it and I hope the rest of Otago is too.”

The “rest” might be a bit ambitious – but certainly there is some support from locals who see a mountain of opportunity lying before them.

Many, though, sit on the fence - trying to separate the myths from the maths.

Mike Thorpe is a senior multimedia journalist for the Herald, based in Christchurch. He has been a broadcast journalist across television and radio for 20 years and joined the Herald in August 2024.