Every Monday Jobs at DOC will take you behind the scenes and into the jobs, the challenges, the highlights, and the personalities of the people who work at the Department of Conservation.
This week we meet geographic information system (GIS) champion, Paul Hughes:
At work …
Name: Paul Hughes
Position: GIS Champion, Wellington Hawke’s Bay
Shark surveying in Fiji
Describe your role: GIS mapping and analysis locally and nationally.
What kind of work/projects are you currently involved in?
Operationalising Treaty Settlements and Biodiversity Information Management.
What led you to your current role in DOC?
Selling GIS systems to the oil exploration industry and to DOC.
Tell us about your 15 minutes of fame
Speaking in Charleston at the 2002 celebration of the final protection of the publicly owned West Coast native forests, and the end to government logging.
Kaka are ginga too
The rule of three…
Three loves
- Life
- My wife Jayne
- My daughter Isabel
Three pet peeves
None.
Working with the community on Mt Ngauruhoe
Three things always in your fridge
- Mac’s beer
- Plum sauce
- Kapiti ice cream
Favourite movie, album, book
Book: It’s a toss up between Nelson Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, and The Universal Heart by Stephanie Dowrick—both are journeys of the soul.
Movie: The Wizard of Oz, we are living it again!
Album: Malcolm McLaren and the Bootzilla Orchestra
Codfish Island Surf Club
Getting personal
What was your favourite birthday present as a kid?
My scooter.
What is your dream holiday location or activity and why?
Ten day tramping trips at Christmas, as it takes the body to a state one seldom experiences.
What do you like to do when you’re not at work?
Beach walking at Paekakariki.
Do you have a special skill/quirk/strange fact that people may not know about you?
I am a Civil Engineer, an expert tradescantia weeder and can pan gold in a billy lid.
What was the most useful thing that somebody once told you?
Follow your inner compass.
If there was a competition for best place in New Zealand where would get your vote?
The Olivine Ice Plateau.
Olivine Ice Plateau
And if there was one native species that ruled them all, what would be your pick?
