Approximately two-thirds of New Zealand voters oppose selling public conservation land, according to a Curia poll commissioned by Forest & Bird published on 21 June 2026.

The poll, reported by RNZ, covered both opposition to conservation land sales and voting intentions across political parties. That combination — asking the same respondents about a policy position and their party preference — allows Forest & Bird to map opposition across the electoral spectrum, rather than simply claiming a headline number.

A roughly 66 percent opposition figure is notable because it sits well above any single party's support base, which means resistance to conservation land sales is not confined to the political left. Voters who back coalition government parties are included in that two-thirds, or the arithmetic does not work. That limits the political cover available to any minister who might want to pursue disposals.

The policy question itself sits in a particular constitutional and legislative context. Public conservation land is administered under the Conservation Act 1987 and managed by the Department of Conservation. Changing the tenure of that land — whether through sale, exchange or some other disposal mechanism — generally requires an act of Parliament or Order in Council, depending on the land classification. It is not something a minister can effect by press release. That statutory friction means polling data of this kind tends to become ammunition in select committee submissions and parliamentary debate well before any transaction could occur.

Forest & Bird is a long-standing player in conservation politics and routinely commissions research timed to legislative or budget cycles. Publishing a poll of this kind in June — mid-year, ahead of the second half of the parliamentary calendar — is consistent with building a public record ahead of any policy moves or Crown land review processes.

The Curia firm is well known to the Gallery. It does commercial and political polling for a range of clients, including party-aligned work, and its methodology attracts the usual scrutiny that accompanies any advocacy-commissioned poll. The RNZ report does not detail sample size, margin of error or fieldwork dates in the verified facts available, so those parameters remain unconfirmed from this source.

What the two-thirds figure does do is set a political baseline. Conservation land disposal — whether framed as rationalisation, iwi settlement, or revenue generation — has repeatedly proved toxic at the ballot box. The 2011 partial asset sales debate, though focused on state-owned enterprises rather than conservation estate, demonstrated how quickly a property-rights argument can be reframed by opponents as a sovereignty question. Conservation land carries additional cultural weight, particularly where it overlaps with areas of significance to Māori, and any government advancing disposal proposals would need to navigate the Treaty settlement framework alongside public opinion.

For practitioners tracking this issue, the more instructive data point will be the party-by-party breakdown within the poll — if and when Forest & Bird or RNZ publish a fuller release. A headline two-thirds number tells you the policy is broadly unpopular; the cross-tabs tell you which coalition partner's voters are most exposed, and that is where the real negotiating pressure sits.

Until that granular data is public, the 66 percent figure stands as a clean, usable number for submitters, advocates and opposition spokespeople going into the second half of 2026.