Wellington  - A giant pink doughnut, erected in the New Zealand town of Springfield two years ago to mark the premiere of The Simpsons Movie, has been destroyed by arsonists, according to news reports on Monday.

The 3.5-metre-diameter doughnut sculpture, unveiled in the tiny South Island township, 70 kilometres north of Christchurch, was set ablaze with the help of kerosene-based barbecue firelighters last Friday night.

Earlier that day, the township committee applied for the formal planning consent to keep the polystyrene and fibreglass sculpture that it had never bothered to get since 20th Century Fox donated it in July 2007.

"This was planned," committee chairman Bill Woods told The Press newspaper. "Someone's buggered the doughnut."

He said that although it had become a major attraction for passing tourists, some locals saw it as a visual degradation of the landscape while others thought the town should "not associate with American cartoons about dysfunctional families."

Woods said, "It will be rebuilt - maybe this time out of concrete."  dpa