Police destroy 67,500 cannabis plants in March phase of national operation
Police destroyed 35,000 cannabis plants in the Bay of Plenty, 19,500 in Northland and 13,000 around Rotorua, Taupo and Tokoroa during March 2002, in the National Cannabis and Crime Operation. The national co-ordinator said the 2001/02 programme was on target to wipe out about 40 per cent of the national crop.
Police destroyed 35,000 cannabis plants in the Bay of Plenty and 19,500 in Northland during March 2002, the Northland total 6,100 more than the year before, as the National Cannabis and Crime Operation continued.[1]Officers found another 13,000 plants around Rotorua, Taupo and Tokoroa, 2,000 more than last season.[1]The national programme co-ordinator, Detective Senior Sergeant Don Lee, said the growing season was consistent with previous years, though a wet summer meant plants matured later than normal, and growers were planting smaller plots in greater numbers, often in bush clearings.[1]
About 500 cannabis plants growing among maize and on isolated parts of Matakana Island in Tauranga Harbour were seized the previous day.[1]At Te Puke, officers seized a shotgun from a grower camped by his crop, and a search of a Papamoa house found 50 cannabis plants growing under lights alongside stolen computers and a mountain bike.[1]Police believed the 2001/02 eradication programme would wipe out about 40 per cent of the national crop, as in previous years.[1]
More than 100 people were arrested in the Waikato in the same week after a nine-month undercover drug investigation, in which drugs worth more than $100,000 and firearms were found.[1]
Case data
Every number and detail the sources state, with the sources that state it.
Only one account of the March phase, a New Zealand Herald report, could be opened.
The 40 per cent figure is the police's own estimate of the national crop destroyed.
The 500 plants seized on Matakana Island may form part of the Bay of Plenty monthly total, so only the regional totals are recorded above.
More than 100 people arrested in the Waikato in the same week came from a separate nine-month undercover drug investigation, not the cannabis programme.
No photograph of the eradication with a recoverable direct image address was found in the opened source.
Police destroyed around 360 cannabis plants found under 15 tents in a Queen Street warehouse in Ōtāhuhu, Auckland. The search warrant was executed on Thursday, 14 May 2026, after an electrician reported unusual wiring, ventilation pipes and a cannabis smell.
Police announced on 25 September 2025 that a month-long operation in Auckland had shut 120 cannabis grow houses, destroyed more than 11,000 plants and seized more than 10 tonnes of cannabis. Thirty people were arrested, most Vietnamese nationals facing deportation, and police put the black-market value at more than NZ$50 million.
New Zealand police seized more than 34,000 cannabis plants and 79 kg of dried cannabis, together valued at about $95 million, in the summer national aerial eradication operation, with results announced 6 May 2022. Officers ran 123 searches, seizing 80 firearms and dismantling 24 indoor commercial grows.
Police destroyed 16,307 cannabis plants in Northland during Operation Jess, run from mid-January to mid-March 2018, the highest district tally in that year's national eradication programme. Officers also seized dried cannabis, firearms, cash and stolen property.
