Seeds of Empire: The Environmental Transformation of New Zealand

Tom Brooking (University of Otago, New Zealand),Eric Pawson (University of Canterbury, New Zealand)

Seeds of Empire: The Environmental Transformation of New Zealand
Format
Hardback
Publisher
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Country
United Kingdom
Published
30 October 2010
Pages
296
ISBN
9781845117979

Seeds of Empire: The Environmental Transformation of New Zealand

Tom Brooking (University of Otago, New Zealand),Eric Pawson (University of Canterbury, New Zealand)

The traditional image of New Zealand is one of verdant landscapes with sheep grazing on lush green pastures. Yet this landscape is almost entirely an artificial creation. As Britain became increasingly reliant on its overseas territories for supplies of food and raw material, so all over the Empire indigenous plants were replaced with English grasses to provide the worked up products of pasture - meat, butter, cheese, wool, and hides. In New Zealand this process was carried to an extreme, with forest cleared and swamps drained. How, why and with what consequences did the transformation of New Zealand into these empires of grass occur? ‘Seeds of Empire’ provides both an exciting appraisal of New Zealand’s environmental history and a long overdue exploration of the significance of grass in the processes of sowing empire.

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