The Dunedin City Council is set to publicly notify its intention to provide natural burials as an option in Dunedin.
If signed off today by the council's community development committee, the public will have one month to make submissions on the proposal, which is to set aside an area of Greenpark Cemetery, near Waldronville, for a one-year trial starting in the 2013-14 financial year.
Natural burial processes are intended to be as environmentally friendly as possible. Nothing non-biodegradable is introduced to the ground and the surface is returned to natural flora and fauna.
A ''natural cemetery'' is an area set aside solely for this kind of burial, with the aim of creating a native forest area or a woodland park.
Council staff have been investigating the idea since councillors asked them to after 20 submissions requesting it were received during the 2010-11 draft annual plan consultation period.
An area at the back of the Greenpark cemetery has been set aside as a natural cemetery. The draft guidelines say the use of toxic embalming fluids would be prohibited, natural fibre clothing encouraged and caskets would have to be bio-degradable.
Plots would be 2.5m by 2.5m to provide planting for the grave, and caskets would be in the active layer of soil, but at least 1m from the surface, marked only by selected plants and, if wanted, a non-treated wooden marker.
The area would be developed as natural bush regeneration, with the GPS location of graves held by the council. The cost would be the same as for a traditional burial.
