BB#61-Nov-Dec-2021

N 61 • NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2021 • HAWKE’S BAY UP CLOSE, IN DEPTH

Do less & save the planet

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Nov/Dec

You’re paying too much for groceries High-anxiety kids HB’s climate change leaders Can wool save sheep?

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505 Karamu Road, Hastings (06) 872 8222 lexusofhawkesbay.co.nz

61 BayBuzz November/December 2021 Make a difference: DO LESS. Supermarkets squeezing us. Wool renaissance. CHB water experiment.

Growing carbon. HB businesses lead on climate. Coping with child anxiety. Shipping woes for HB exporters. Wattie's future. Gardening for body and spirit. Bay rich in classical music. It's party time!

Cover photo: Alexandra Tylee by Florence Charvin. This page: Rowers at Clive by Tom Allan.

Featured Contributor Follow us at: baybuzzhb Articles online at: baybuzz.co.nz Editorial enquiries editors@baybuzz.co.nz Advertising enquiries Sarah Hoffmann sarah@baybuzz.co.nz

Elizabeth-Marie Nes BayBuzz online

Reach BayBuzz by mail BayBuzz, PO Box 8322, Havelock North

BayBuzz Team EDITOR: Tom Belford ASSISTANT EDITOR: Lizzie Russell SENIOR WRITERS: Kay Bazzard; Tom Belford; Abby Beswick; Sarah Cameron; Bridget FreemanRock; Keith Newman; Lizzie Russell; Jess Soutar Barron; Mark Sweet COLUMNISTS: Charles Daugherty; Andrew Frame; Katie Nimon; Paul Paynter; Dominic Salmon; Ian Thomas; Louise Ward BUSINESS WRITER: Brenda Newth EDITOR’S RIGHT HAND: Brooks Belford PHOTOGRAPHY: Tom Allan; Florence Charvin ILLUSTRATION: Brett Monteith; Israel Smith DESIGN: Unit Design Max Parkes; Giselle Reid ONLINE: Elizabeth-Marie Nes BUSINESS & DISTRIBUTION MANAGER: Kathleen Botha PRINTING: Blue Star Group

Photo: Florence Charvin

Bee in the know 4 6 7 12

From the editor BayBuzz hero – Link Organics Bee in the know by Lizzie Russell Climate update

Features

ISSN 2253-2625 (Print) ISSN 2253-2633 (Online)

This document is printed on an environmentally responsible paper produced using Elemental Chlorine Free (ECF) pulp sourced from Sustainable & Legally Harvested Farmed Trees, and manufactured under the strict ISO14001 Environmental Management System.

I call myself a keyboard warrior specialist, but it was my skills and availability as a house-sitter that first put me in touch with Tom & Brooks Belford and BayBuzz! For five years now I have been providing online support and looking after social media here, while building my own marketing agency People&People and growing my blog Hawke’s Bay Born and Proud. When I'm not busy working on a digital device, you'll find me exploring Japanese culture as part of the Japan Society of Hawke’s Bay.

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Photo: Florence Charvin

16 DO LESS and change the world!

Katie Nimon Each of us can reduce our environmental imprint. DO LESS shows how.

22 Can wool save sheep?

Keith Newman Wool is fighting to reclaim its value, including here in HB. 30 Possible solution or ‘playing god’?

Bridget Freeman-Rock How a scheme to replenish aquifers in CHB might work.

36 Growing carbon in HB soils Tom Belford More soil carbon means healthier, water-retaining soils. Can we ‘grow’ it?

40 Political update – Good for planet is good for business Tom Belford HB businesses lead on climate change mitigation.

And election lessons.

44 Helping an anxious child Abby Beswick Children with severe anxiety – and their parents – need help.

48 Growing food for happiness, health and security Gretta Carney A garden is healthy food for body and spirit.

52 Supermarkets have us by the wallet Paul Paynter Yes, we’re paying too much … competition needed.

Photo: Florence Charvin

BayBiz …

56 Wattie’s: Preserving the legacy Brenda Newth A bullish prognosis from the NZ managing director.

60 Big decisions for HB exporters Murray Painter Sorry, ongoing shipping constraints for HB.

66 Let’s demolish construction waste Dominic Salmon Construction waste is half of landfills; we can do better.

68 Des Ratima – thinking globally, acting locally Charles Daugherty A tribute to a remarkable grassroots leader.

Ideas & opinions

Culture

62 The myth of money vs morality Nick Stewart Ethical investing can protect both values.

64 Hospitality industry needs to be more inventive Glenn Fulcher Despite Covid, jobs await in our restaurants and kitchens.

70 Bravo! For the love of music Sarah Cameron The high notes of classical music in Hawke's Bay. 76 Party time!

Ian Thomas We’ve forgotten how.

78 Armchair travel Louise Ward Can’t fly, so put your seatback back … and read.

80 Clive … Who needs Paris or The Hague?

Jess Soutar Barron

48 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 3

F R O M T H E ED I TO R TO M BEL FO R D

Like most of our year-end editions of BayBuzz, this one is a true smorgasbord.

Hopefully something for everyone’s taste … or nerve endings waiting to be agitated.

Perhaps surprisingly, the good news here involves climate change. Not because the trend line is yet improving, but because Hawke’s Bay businesses, including our farmers, are trying. That’s my beat in this edition, with a report on a local dairy farmer ‘growing’ carbon in his soil, to an accounting of what some of our leading businesses are doing to reduce their environmental footprint, and specifically their climate impact.

Water security is an obvious casualty of climate change, so Bridget FreemanRock takes a look at the rationale for and hopes pinned on HBRC’s ‘managed aquifer recharge’ experiment down in Central Hawke’s Bay. Can we capture surface water for underground storage? Some are hopeful; some are unconvinced.

Pastoral farming remains a mainstay of Hawke’s Bay rural economy, and these days many worry about it in terms of the survival of beef and dairy in the face of environmental resistance, health concerns and ‘manufactured’ beef and meat substitutes.

But hey, don’t forget wool, a major historic contributor to the region’s economy! Keith Newman looks at efforts to bring about a wool resurgence, capitalizing upon its natural attributes capable of weaning us off plastic substitutes. Will there be a

wool renaissance? Some big players in Hawke’s Bay are working to that end.

As we work our way through the food chain, you’ll find articles on supermarket pricing by Paul Paynter (who has an insider view as supplier of your Yummyfruit apples), versus growing your own stuff, whose virtues are touted by Hapī’s Gretta Carney.

And if you buy food in a can (I’ll admit creamed corn is my favourite), read Brenda Newth’s update on Wattie’s and its future prospects.

Murray Painter describes ongoing disruptions in the shipping world, which could seriously constrain the region’s food exports. As well as those imported goodies you were expecting for Christmas.

But maybe you should think of alternative ways to celebrate and gift at Christmas. And Alexandra Tylee and George Miller have launched DO LESS, offering pointers on how to do just that. Katie Nimon tells their story.

There are of plenty of other issues and opinions to weigh in this edition.

Abby Beswick reports on children with severe anxiety afflictions and how they, and their parents, can be helped.

Dom Salmon tackles construction waste, which constitutes half the waste going into our landfills. EIT’s Glenn Fulcher writes on opportunities in the food side of the local hospitality sector. Charles Daugherty eulogizes Des Ratima. And Nick Stewart educates us on ethical investing, a way for our money to serve our values.

And finally we get to the fun stuff.

Sarah Cameron walks us through

Hawke’s Bay’s rich world of classical music, musicians and performers … amateur and professional. Louise Ward reviews books to satisfy the wanderlust we can’t indulge by traveling these days. However, Jess Soutar Barron says try Clive! And Ian Thomas urges us to party like yesterday, which requires the right food!

As I said, this edition is a smorgasbord. Enjoy the feast.

And have a happy Christmas!

Tom Belford tom@baybuzz.co.nz

Tom has been a two-term HB Regional Councillor. His past includes the Carter White House, building Ted Turner’s first philanthropic organisation, doing heaps of marketing consulting for major non-profits and corporates.

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4 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

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BAY B UZ Z H E R O

Gay Hartshorn & Robert Sanders, Links Organics It’s 20 years since Gay and Robert started Links Organics, and they were early arrivals at the Hawke’s Bay Farmers Market. For many Hawke’s Bay locals and visitors, the weekend morning trip to the market would be incomplete without swinging by the Links stall to peruse and purchase from the lush selection of seedlings, vegetables and more organic treasures.

The stall itself is plastic-free, with packaging for the plants mostly re-purposed pots, and they’ve been potted up nice and early so they’re ready to go, and hardy.

Many Hawke’s Bay edible summer gardens will be coming to life now full of Links plants.

Thank you, and happy growing, Gay and Robert!

Photo: Florence Charvin

BEE I N TH E K N OW / L I Z Z I E R US SELL

ABOUT THE COVER

Alex Tylee (pictured) and co-founder George Miller are on a mission to do less. They've started Project DO LESS with that idea that less consumption will lead to more considered choices that benefit the environment. Check out Katie Nimon's story on page 16 to find out more about doing less, and join the movement!

WHAT'S HOT WHAT'S NOT

Photo: Florence Charvin

HOT

NOT

• Tu Meke Don arriving in Hastings at the Tribune Precinct.

• FAWC – back (all going to plan) November 5-15.

• Ripping off the mask when you get back into the car.

• The arrival of the long, balmy summer days.

• Supporting local and small when you’re shopping this festive season.

• Christmas!

• Tu Meke Don leaving central Napier.

• Events uncertainty thanks to Delta.

•F orgetting you’re still wearing your mask while driving the car.

•T he HB hills heading into summer having had not enough spring rain.

•T hinking your overseas online purchases are going to make it in time.

•C hristmas without the whānau who can’t get home thanks to the MIQ clog.

HOT:

The arrival of the long, balmy summer days

B EE I N T HE K N OW

Holly Morgan: Potter

Photo: Florence Charvin

There’s an alchemy to potting. The way clay and glaze and heat and time come together to form something unique. Chatting to potter Holly Morgan suggests a beautiful parallel, in the manner her practice and business have fallen into place.

Living in Whangamatā, surfing daily and working as a cleaner, having just returned from years travelling and living overseas, Holly signed up for a pottery class. She joked with master potter Andrew Killick that doing this ‘all day everyday’ would be a dream come true. Then, in walked his apprentice, and resigned. Holly took up that role, fell “head over heels in love with clay” and spent the next year assisting Killick and learning the art, craft and trade.

In 2018 she and her husband Josh established Morgan Made, and in 2019 after stumbling by luck on the perfect

workspace here, they moved their lives and the business to Napier.

Holly works from the studio-gallery on Napier’s Market Street, with her wheel in the window. “This way, people can see me making pottery right here in the CBD,” Holly says. “And they come in and chat, see what I’m doing; everyone has a pottery story to share.”

Her aesthetic is clean and restrained, featuring calming, neutral glazes with free-hand flourishes. A current focus on bases and shades for lighting is set to bring electrician Josh in as a collaborator.

In another stroke of serendipity, Holly was halfway through a four-week residency at Coromandel’s Driving Creek Railway and Potteries when the August lockdown was announced. “We were firing the wood kiln, it was just reaching 1300 degrees,” Holly says.

“There was no way I was packing up and heading home – all my work was in there!” So her stay lasted closer to six weeks. She and two others had the run of the place, with its surrounding bush, the totally immersive working environment, and all that quiet. Holly credits her time at Driving Creek for pushing her work and her approach in a new direction.

Fateful timing aside, there’s real toil that goes into this life. In addition to making and selling her work, Holly also teaches. She offers private lessons (around 2 hours) for up to four people at a time, up to four times a week. The long-term plan is for Josh to work in the business full-time too. Pop in and see Holly next time you’re in the Napier CBD – she’s got fascinating stories, remarkable work and the magic of clay to share.

Caption. Photo: Florence Charvin

8 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Ten Hits of the Hawke’s Bay Summer The long days are upon us! Bring on Summer in the Bay. You deserve some really lovely moments this season.

It’s been quite a year. Relax and enjoy:

1. Juicy summer fruit dripping onto the steering wheel straight after making your purchases at roadside stalls. Peaches, plums, apricots, nectarines, strawberries and blueberries... Sweet, sweet summer right there.

2. A Central HB day roadtrip – second-hand shops in Waipawa, coffee and pastries from TenKu in Waipukurau, a mission up to check out the view from Pukeora Hill and a meander out to Mangakuri, Blackhead, Aramoana, Pourere or Kairākau Beach.

A day following the HB Art Guide has to include a visit to Lizzie Beere's studio to see her work and chat about all things art, floral and local. Lizzie's studio is on St George's Road. Look for the OPEN sign most days or get in touch through the Art Guide.

Photo: Florence Charvin

come and go, popping in and out of the water.

an ear out for the programme, which will be announced during November.

5. Sunny afternoon wines. I’m thinking about the beanbags out the front of the Urban Winery, with a glass of Heartwood Chardonnay in hand.

Or relaxing in the Common Room courtyard. Or a lazy few hours at Three Wise Birds Garden Bar on Pakowhai Road. Laxing on the lawn at Trinity Hill. You get the picture!

8. A roam around the region’s open studios. Check out which artists and craftspeople welcome visitors at hawkesbayartguide.co.nz. Support and buy local, and you might just find yourself inspired along the way!

3. The sweaty satisfaction of making it to Bell Rock.

6. An adventure north – ok, south if you’re in Wairoa. Lake Tūtira, Guthrie Smith Arboretum, Waipātiki Beach.

There’s bliss and beauty just up the Pacific Coast Highway.

4. Skipping a day of work to spend a few hours on a towel at the little Port Beach in Napier. Watching the ships

7. Black Barn Open Air Cinema.

Dates are set for this season - 27-30 December and 2-6 January 2022. Keep

9. A day on bikes on the Clifton Coast.

Watching the surfers. Breakfast at Hygge. Lunching at Clearview. Wine tasting at Elephant Hill. Relaxing on the lawn at Te Awanga Estate.

10. That special Hawke’s Bay Farmers’ Market just before Christmas. So much bounty, so much festive joy, so many perfectly sustainable (i.e edible) gifts for the ones you love.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 9

BE E I N T H E K N OW

The Tribune Precinct

Hastings East has become the Bay’s place to be! First it was the renewal of the East 200 Block, kicked off by the Common Room and surrounding businesses, then the plans started swirling for the redevelopment of the Opera House and Municipal Buildings (completion due mid-2022) and just a block over, the Tribune Precinct on the former newspaper site continues to evolve.

Already open and operational at Tribune are Brave Brewery, The Dental Institute, Midlands, Morgan Lane, Willis Legal and BAZAAR. The first building completed in the

10 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

project houses Real World, Creative Marketing, Digital Circus and serviced offices for smaller businesses.

By the end of the year, the next batch of businesses are due to take up their spaces. The corner spot (behind the iconic façade) will house furniture store Kindred Road. Napier cult favourite Tu Meke Don are taking their donburi and sushi offering to Hastings, and they’ll land next to OMG Bread’s large new spot – a full open bakery and healthy café, which opens on to a sunny courtyard.

The Atrium promises to be a special space, with a spiral staircase and

full-sized trees reaching up to the upper storey where offices, including Glenn Cook Technologies and GHD Engineers, will enjoy a beautiful balcony.

Tribune’s Barb Hansen is confident that, although there have been delays and challenges, things look set for completion by December, and comments that this is an exciting time to be doing business in Hastings’ Eastside.

“It’s a great community to be part of, with different businesses and projects feeding off each other. There’s such a fantastic energy here.”

Photos: Hazel Redmond Photography

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 11

CLIM ATE

“New Zealand has a unique opportunity to be a world leader in the adoption of zero emissions aircraft given the country’s commitment to renewable energy which can be used to generate green hydrogen and our highly connected regional air network.”

GREG FORAN, AIR NEW ZEALAND CHIEF EXECUTIVE

Climate update Cabinet began consulting on the Emissions Reduction Plan in early October, with the final plan to be released by the end of May next year in line with the 2022 Budget.

Minister of Climate Change, James Shaw said, “Cabinet’s decision allows organisations and communities key to the Emissions Reduction Plan’s success to focus on getting through the worst of the Covid outbreak before engaging with the plan.”

With NZ’s greenhouse emissions still rising, critics are not buying the delay, which means NZ will be one of several dozen nations not taking new GHG emissions goals to the UN climate summit in Scotland. Columnist Rod Oram headlined: “Govt lacks integrity, skill and will on climate.”

But maybe there’s hope yet.

NZ scientists have participated in an overseas pilot project that has trained cows to pee in latrine pens – MooLoo’s. Capturing the urine at large scale could potentially have a major impact on both water contamination and GHG emissions. Only takes 15 days, much faster than children!

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Training cows to use "MooLoos".

Zero-emissions aircraft Air New Zealand and Airbus have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to cooperate on a research project to better understand the pros and cons of flying zeroemissions aircraft in New Zealand, with a view to adding hydrogen-powered passenger planes to its fleet by 2030.

“New Zealand has a unique opportunity to be a world leader in the adoption of zero emissions aircraft

given the country’s commitment to renewable energy which can be used to generate green hydrogen and our highly connected regional air network,” Air New Zealand chief executive Greg Foran said. “At this stage, both hydrogen and battery electric aircraft are still on the table as potential options for our shorter domestic flights, along with Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) for long haul operations.”

If emissions are not reduced by 2030, they will need to be substantially reduced thereafter to compensate for the slow start on the path to net zero emissions.

Climeworks’ Orca carbon capture plant.

Climate Summit – Scotland

Limits to fossil fuel

In preparation for the major November global confab in Scotland on mitigating climate change, the UN issued a ‘synthesis report’ that estimates the impact of existing and newly proposed national commitments (NDCs) to limit GHG emission.

UN Secretary General António Guterres says the report shows “the world is on a catastrophic pathway.”

The total global GHG emission level in 2030, taking into account implementation of all the latest NDCs, is expected to be 16.3% above the 2010 level. But to be consistent with global emission pathways with no or limited overshoot of the 1.5 °C goal (considered a dire tipping point), global net anthropogenic CO2 emissions need to decline by about 45% from the 2010 level by 2030, reaching net zero around 2050.

Still missing are new pledges from New Zealand and 69 other countries, including China, which currently produces the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions, as well as Saudi Arabia and India, both large economies with a significant climate footprint.

As the report observes, “this implies an urgent need for either a significant increase in the level of ambition of NDCs between now and 2030 or a significant overachievement of the latest NDCs, or a combination of both, in order to attain cost-optimal emission levels suggested in many of the scenarios considered by the IPCC. If emissions are not reduced by 2030, they will need to be substantially reduced thereafter to compensate for the slow start on the path to net zero emissions.

Supporting this UN assessment, a recent analysis by Climate Action Tracker found that no major emitters have a climate pledge in keeping with the 1.5 degree target. Several countries, including Britain and the European Union, are close.

Nature recently published an updated model of limits to fossil-fuel extraction, showing that nearly 90% of economically viable global coal reserves must be left in the ground for the world to have a 50% chance of meeting the 1.5 °C international goal.

The report states that the world must not emit more than 580 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide before 2100. This would mean leaving 89% of coal reserves, 58% of oil reserves and 59% of gas reserves unextracted.

Orca carbon capture plant Zurich-based Climeworks opened its Orca “direct air capture” project in Iceland in September – the world’s biggest carbon capture plant so far. The Orca plant sells the most expensive carbon offset in the world, costing almost US$1400 a tonne of CO2 removed, but demand is strong, with Bill Gates an early customer, and commercial demand so high (the plant has sold out of credits for its 12-year lifespan) that Climeworks is accelerating the development of their much larger plant.

Orca will collect about 4,000 tonnes of CO² a year and store it underground.

The next plant will be ten times the size. Still, we’re going to need a few more to make a dent in the 33 billion tonnes of the gas forecast by the International Energy Agency to be emitted worldwide this year.

Yale University survey As the earth warms and changes, science communication becomes increasingly important.

Folks at Yale University have devised a communication tool used widely in the US for segmenting audiences into six groups in order to more effectively speak to the population on the issue:

• Alarmed (26%): Are convinced that global warming is happening, caused by humans, and an urgent threat. Strongly supportive of aggressive policies designed to reign in carbon pollution.

• Concerned (29%): Also know global warming is real and caused by human activities, but mostly believe that severe impacts are not yet “here and now.”

• Cautious (19%): The fence-sitters, the undecided – unsure whether the temperatures are rising or not, what’s causing it if they are, or how serious global heating may be.

• Disengaged (6%): Know little about the problem as they rarely or never hear or talk about it.

• Doubtful (12%): Don’t believe the planet is warming, or if it is, the changes are natural and the risk is greatly exaggerated.

• Dismissive (8%): Are convinced that the climate isn’t changing.

Most endorse conspiracy theories, it’s a hoax.

At BayBuzz, we’d like to think the stats would indicate we’re a little more evolved in New Zealand! You can sort yourself by taking Yale’s super short survey at: bit.ly/3Cub6Ec

Covid-19 and climate change A new multi-agency report published by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) shows that Covid-19 did not slow the relentless advance of climate change. United in Science 2021 reports that after the temporary blip due to the economic slowdown in 2020 and 2021, carbon dioxide emissions are rapidly recovering.

Concentrations of the major greenhouse gases – carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2 O) continued to increase in 2020 and the first half of 2021.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 13

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Recovery

Jump Starters There’s nothing like the whole world shutting down to refocus us on the benefits of buying and supporting local. BayBuzz talks to three Hawke’s Bay businesses who have moved swiftly to turn a crisis into a positive, and found strength in community spirit along the way. Story by Giselle Reid and Lizzie Russell.

Ultrella From small beginnings selling jars of natural deodorant at the Piecemakers Pop-up and Hereworth Christmas markets, Mel Lewis soon realised she had to take her business to the next level if she was going to compete with a growing number of competitors in the personal care space.

The new business was over a year in the planning. “My customers had told me the products they wanted to be using, but I didn’t have the technical skills to create them.” Through the Hawke’s Bay Business Hub, she applied for, and won, a Callaghan Innovation R&D grant at the start of 2019. That financial support enabled her to work with a leading product formulator to bring her ideas to fruition.

Ultrella Natural Deodorant is the first deodorant in NZ and Australia (“and the whole world, as far as we know”) to be able to reduce sweating naturally. The hero ingredient is a natural Botox alternative called IBR-Snowflake®, a plant extract made from Summer Snowflake bulbs.

This ingredient has been clinically proven to reduce sweating by 36% ... up until now you’ve had to use an antiperspirant to get results like this.

Ultrella was launched the Friday before lockdown. “It was a completely surreal day,” says Mel. “I very nearly didn’t go ahead, but then I kept thinking, ‘If I don’t do it now, when will I do it? There’s never a perfect time to launch a business, so I just leapt in and went for it.”

Prior to lockdown, she had been in negotiations with four major NZ retailers, but those conversations halted immediately. In this instance, being small worked in her favour, quickly pivoting to focus

entirely on online sales. Fortunately, Ultrella already had an online store, built by Aimee Stewart’s team at Connect Plus.

“When it looked like we were going into lockdown, I made a dash up to our warehouse in Napier, and loaded up my car with as many boxes of products as I could fit in so we could dispatch from home if required. It was such a lucky move.”

There were a couple of nervous weeks as Mel waited to find out if Ultrella was included on the MBIE’s register for Essential Goods. Once that was established, Ultrella was good to go.

“Having the population at home, spending a lot of time online, actually worked in our favour during those first few weeks. It gave us a chance to connect with potential customers and educate people about our ethos and our products.”

The groundswell of ‘buy New Zealand’ made sentiment on social media, and in particular the now 500,000 strong New Zealand Made Products Facebook page, provided a huge kick-start for Ultrella. The response to one unsponsored post on that Facebook page was “mental”, says Mel, “I had over 1,000 comments and questions to respond to. It took me days to go back to everyone. I posted on the Saturday night.

By Sunday lunchtime it was obvious we were going to run out of courier supplies.

It was really stressful trying to get more down from Auckland. The support from other local businesses was incredible.” Mel put out a call for help and Steve Christie from Blackroll NZ, Tom Ormond from Hawthorne Coffee, Nathan from Blackbird Goods and Shaz and Garon from Ecokiosk were among the

Ultrella founder, Mel Lewis. Photo: Florence Charvin JULY/AUGUST 2020 • BAYBUZZ • 23

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do less

Story by Katie Nimon Photos by Florence Charvin

nd a change the world Has anyone watched a documentary on climate change or veganism and immediately felt an overwhelming sense of doom?

Recently, I watched a Netflix documentary called Kiss the Ground, which talked about the finite nature of our soil, and its effect on climate change due to the soil’s ability to absorb and recycle carbon.

Anyway, I was engrossed. When it ended, I immediately felt like the world was going to end in 60 years, but nothing could be done about it.

But then, before the credits, they gave us some simple actions that could make a difference. Instead of feeling doomed, I felt hopeful and energized, immediately starting to plan my home vegetable garden and orchard and googling the best composting system.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 17

18 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

“ What will you tell your children when they ask what you did?”

“ We don’t have to change laws or do TED talks, we can just turn off our lights, flush less, and use up our leftovers. Project DO LESS wants us to know that by just doing less together, we will have a big impact.”

This was how Alex Tylee, owner and chef at the infamous Pipi Café, felt after listening to a TED Talk by Al Gore.

The line that hooked her was, “What will you tell your children when they ask what you did?”

At the same time, Alex had been watching her country garden slowly dry up after seasons without sustainable rain, constantly wondering whether to fight nature and use up precious water or leave them to their fate. Alex then drowned herself in climate change literature, trying to find the answer. Every book told her that if we don’t do something radical in the next few years it would be impossible to turn this thing around.

The scientific concepts behind climate change are nothing but frightening, and although most nations have the knowledge and ability to fix the problem (and the money, if we changed our priorities), we still need the manpower. It’s amazing what people can achieve when they set their minds to it, but we can’t all expect to have the strength of a mother lifting a car off a child.

What we can do, is be civilians called to arms, much like the people of Ramsgate, when 850 private boats sailed to Dunkirk to save the soldiers.

This can be our Operation Dynamo.

This is about where Alex met George.

George Miller is co-founder and director of Mogul, an internet marketing agency. Alex went to George to create a platform to mobilise the civilian army. She wanted to help our community understand that every little thing counts, and for people to start to engage with the problem and become

part of the solution rather than just hoping it will go away.

Together, they decided that regardless of the medium, a website or a Facebook page, they needed to create a space where people could go to get suggestions on how to do less. Just like I felt at the end of one of the many climate change documentaries out there, we’re always looking for a small actionable step we can take to make a difference.

Alex likens Project DO LESS to the women that knitted socks, and worked in factories during the war. They didn’t have to be on the frontline to help the fight, and we don’t have to be scientists, politicians, or even activists to make a difference in climate change.

We don’t have to change laws or do TED talks, we can just turn off our lights, flush less, and use up our leftovers. Project DO LESS wants us to know that by just doing less together, we will have a big impact.

Alex and George want us to go back to the old days where everyone washed their plastic bags and it was cool to be thrifty. In fact thrift shopping is now so popular, it often costs more than buying new. But let’s make cycling to work that cool. Let’s make leftovers better than takeaways, and let’s get our whole community involved. Why not

“ While the new idea of a ‘lockdown’ is difficult for businesses, it’s definitely taught us some valuable lessons.”

dream big! This same documentary that talked about the impending doom of soil nutrient depletion, also showed the entire city of San Fransisco getting involved in a composting programme, that reduced waste and helped replenish the soil quality.

While Project DO LESS is giving us small steps to reduce waste and reverse climate change, Alex and George hope that one day soon, communities will have DO LESS days or even become DO LESS towns or cities.

If we all follow Project DO LESS on Facebook and make a promise to do less each day, no matter how small, then maybe we can turn this thing around. So rally the troops, there are lots of resources online, and with a little inspiration from Project DO LESS, we can end up doing more for the environment.

While the new idea of a ‘lockdown’ is difficult for businesses, it’s definitely taught us some valuable lessons.

We’re forced to slow down, and we’re reminded that we can still celebrate and show our love for people without buying them presents and going out for dinner. Last Easter we had an amazing brunch in the garden, and decorated the table with things from around the house. We hosted birthday parties via Zoom which meant more people could be together. This year, when Father’s Day came around, we planted trees at a social distance.

With Christmas on its way, Alex and George share their top tips to help us do less, and as a result, do more for our environment.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 19

How to do less this holiday season With Alex and George from Project DO LESS Step 1. Slow down Don’t do so much, slow down, and enjoy the moments with your family and friends. If you’re taking the time to savour the moments, you’re less likely to create waste and more likely to create memories.

Step 2. Adopt new planet-friendly traditions Start something new in your family or community that’s kind on the planet. Create a tradition that inspires others. Icelanders gift books so religiously at Christmas, it’s now known as the Christmas Book Flood.

Step 3. Be conscious of your Christmas crackers Instead of buying crackers that only end up in the Christmas rubbish bag, make your own from last year’s wrapping paper and recycling, or buy some that have been made with love and quality sustainable materials.

Step 4. Buy local and buy well Make conscientious choices that are good for you and the community, like buying locally-made and long-lasting gifts. A wooden toy from Hohepa will last a lifetime longer than a trendy plastic toy that’s made in China.

Step 5. Give something that reduces waste Use Christmas as an opportunity to help your friends and family do less. Gift presents that reduce waste, like a Keep Cup or reusable water bottle. Buying someone a benchtop compost bin might inspire their journey.

Step 6. Don’t wrap your presents with rubbish Wrap your presents with recycled paper or beeswax paper. Or better yet, try furoshiki (Japanese fabric wrapping) which is just as fun as origami. You can even use a tea towel or table cloth, which becomes part of the gift.

Step 7. Use up your leftovers Turn your leftover Christmas cake into a Boozy Ice Cream Sundae.

Break the cake into chunks and line a dish and pour over some liquer followed by a scoop of your favourite ice cream. Finish with a leftover Christmas chocolate ganache (just add cream) and whatever toppings you can find.

Step 8. Gift homemade Make your presents with love. You don’t have to be a talented crafter, it can be as simple as some baking or preserves with local seasonal produce. Either way, you get to skip the queues and get festive at home!

Step 9. Give your time Bring back the voucher books you made as a kid, and offer to babysit for a friend, or volunteer to help where it’s needed most. By giving a day in the garden to your mum, she gets quality time and a tidy garden.

Step 10. Do your research Try not to buy from brands that aren’t sustainable. It’s easy to find products that are good for the planet, they’ll tell you. Support those that support the environment, and do a little research if you’re not sure.

20 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

BayBuzz Online Did you know we now have heaps of content available digitally?

Recovery

Jump Starters There’s nothing like the whole world shutting down to refocus us on the benefits of buying and supporting local. BayBuzz talks to three Hawke’s Bay businesses who have moved swiftly to turn a crisis into a positive, and found strength in community spirit along the way. Story by Giselle Reid and Lizzie Russell.

3

Ultrella From small beginnings selling jars of natural deodorant at the Piecemakers Pop-up and Hereworth Christmas markets, Mel Lewis soon realised she had to take her business to the next level if she was going to compete with a growing number of competitors in the personal care space.

The new business was over a year in the planning. “My customers had told me the products they wanted to be using, but I didn’t have the technical skills to create them.” Through the Hawke’s Bay Business Hub, she applied for, and won, a Callaghan Innovation R&D grant at the start of 2019. That financial support enabled her to work with a leading product formulator to bring her ideas to fruition.

Ultrella Natural Deodorant is the first deodorant in NZ and Australia (“and the whole world, as far as we know”) to be able to reduce sweating naturally. The hero ingredient is a natural Botox alternative called IBR-Snowflake®, a plant extract made from Summer Snowflake bulbs.

This ingredient has been clinically proven to reduce sweating by 36% ... up until now you’ve had to use an antiperspirant to get results like this.

Ultrella was launched the Friday before lockdown. “It was a completely surreal day,” says Mel. “I very nearly didn’t go ahead, but then I kept thinking, ‘If I don’t do it now, when will I do it? There’s never a perfect time to launch a business, so I just leapt in and went for it.”

Prior to lockdown, she had been in negotiations with four major NZ retailers, but those conversations halted immediately. In this instance, being small worked in her favour, quickly pivoting to focus

entirely on online sales. Fortunately, Ultrella already had an online store, built by Aimee Stewart’s team at Connect Plus.

“When it looked like we were going into lockdown, I made a dash up to our warehouse in Napier, and loaded up my car with as many boxes of products as I could fit in so we could dispatch from home if required. It was such a lucky move.”

There were a couple of nervous weeks as Mel waited to find out if Ultrella was included on the MBIE’s register for Essential Goods. Once that was established, Ultrella was good to go.

“Having the population at home, spending a lot of time online, actually worked in our favour during those first few weeks. It gave us a chance to connect with potential customers and educate people about our ethos and our products.”

The groundswell of ‘buy New Zealand’ made sentiment on social media, and in particular the now 500,000 strong New Zealand Made Products Facebook page, provided a huge kick-start for Ultrella. The response to one unsponsored post on that Facebook page was “mental”, says Mel, “I had over 1,000 comments and questions to respond to. It took me days to go back to everyone. I posted on the Saturday night.

By Sunday lunchtime it was obvious we were going to run out of courier supplies.

It was really stressful trying to get more down from Auckland. The support from other local businesses was incredible.” Mel put out a call for help and Steve Christie from Blackroll NZ, Tom Ormond from Hawthorne Coffee, Nathan from Blackbird Goods and Shaz and Garon from Ecokiosk were among the

Ultrella founder, Mel Lewis. Photo: Florence Charvin JULY/AUGUST 2020 • BAYBUZZ • 23

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The Buzz e-newsletter

2. baybuzz.co.nz updated website

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BayBuzz digital magazine

Are you signed up for our weekly e-newsletter, The Buzz?

Did you know our web content is growing by leaps and bounds?

Have you seen the digital version of BayBuzz magazine?

Delivered Saturday morning to your email in-box.

For example, our Hawke’s Bay events listings are the most comprehensive available.

Read BayBuzz on your tablet or laptop, exactly as printed. Great for your overseas friends.

You can find it all here: www.baybuzz.co.nz/digital

Can wool save sheep?

Aotearoa New Zealand, once said to be living off the sheep’s back, is now struggling with a wool industry in deep manure unless it can reclaim old markets, develop new ones, and capitalise on the global shift from plastic to sustainable natural fibres.

Photo: Tom Allan

“Average lamb returns have increased dramatically from $13 per ewe in 1987 to $130 today, while strong or crossbred wool has remained about $3 per kilo for 34 years. At the time of writing, it was under $2kg.”

CRAIG HICKSON

Story by Keith Newman While our sheep meat is fetching top dollar, flock numbers are in freefall with most wool clip profit garnered beyond the farm gate, leaving many growers wondering why they bother.

It’s late in the game but wool advocates – with Hawke’s Bay in the vanguard – are finally pushing back against the trend to breeds with no fleece and suggestions the industry is broken, unsustainable or bad for the environment.

Crossbred growers mainly used in carpets until synthetics pulled the wool out from under them, produce 80% of our output with fine wool making up the balance, fetching up to $26 per kg in good years.

Craig Hickson founder of Hastingsbased Progressive Meats says average lamb returns have increased dramatically from $13 per ewe in 1987 to $130 today, while strong or crossbred wool has remained about $3 per kilo for 34 years. At the time of writing, it was under $2kg.

“It’s gone nowhere, the return is less than the cost of shearing and it’s making no contribution to your overall farming costs,” says Hickson.

He says farmers are shearing less frequently and sheep are ending up at the works with longer fleeces than any time in the past.

For the past two decades fine Merino wool, used in high-end garments such as suits, sportswear and outdoor clothing, has far outshone its coarser cousin, but WoolWorks CEO Nigel Hales says New Zealand is “riding on the coat tails” of the Australian Merino business.

He says they made massive

investment in that market and are driving global prices while most Kiwi fine wool ‘hero’ brands are now owned offshore.

And he says, 20% of New Zealand wool is exported without any added value, including the majority of the Merino clip.

Although major efforts are now underway to rescue our crossbred strong wool, including a merger of big players and government and industry led initiatives, Hales is convinced we also need to ramp up local demand and production.

“In the days when we had 50 million sheep and three million people we used about 22% of that wool volume ourselves. However, we forgot that our grandmothers told us wool is a natural and durable fibre and were happy to buy plastic.”

Hales says getting internal wool use back to 20-25% and manufacturing some of those products ourselves would change the game. “With 5 million people and a lot more houses using wool on the floor and in the ceiling and walls it would not only be warm but a flame retardant.”

In 2020, Agriculture minister Damien O’Connor convened a series of working groups that morphed into the Strong Wool Action Group (SWAG), which has received government and industry funding to revitalise the market.

The goal is a more connected and coordinated sector, partnering with global experts, farmers and the supply chain, increased investment and rebuilding capability through training, R&D and stronger governance.

In a separate move, a NZ National

Standard for Wool was established in May with 15 new wool companies signing up for an assurance of integrity, traceability, biosecurity, food safety, environmental sustainability and animal health and welfare.

Hawke’s Bay owes much of its past prosperity from the late 1840s to the rapid expansion of sheep farming. Wool was our major export until the 1970s (eventually overtaken by frozen meat exports, which began in the 1880s), making up around half of farm incomes.

Sheep farmers began switching to dairy in the 1980s and by 1987 urban sprawl, increased diversification, including viticulture and plantation forestry, contributed to a 40-year decline in the strong wool industry.

In 1982, ‘peak sheep’ year, we had 70 million sheep dotting our paddocks.

By June 2020, according to Statistics NZ, we were down to 26 million with 6.5 million shorn off that number in the past decade.

Hawke’s Bay was hit hard with sheep numbers falling 12% (346,000) in 2020 from 2019, partly through the convergence of drought and Covid, leaving us with an estimated 2.5 million sheep.

Synthetics deliver blow

A near fatal blow to our quality carpet and clothing production was delivered by synthetics, which almost completely owned the market around 1996.

Since synthetics became the dominant floor covering we’ve had decades of bumbling along without a strategic comeback plan, partly due to internal politics without a levy or subsidy to

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 23

Waipukurau-based wool broker Philippa Wright at Wright Wool. Phillipa’s wool innovation is “bouncy and soft” luxury pillows.

fund a new strategy.

The New Zealand Wool Board was disestablished in 2001 with the industry essentially held together by a fragmented jigsaw of grower-owned businesses and brokers each looking after their own interests.

The big obstacle to restoring the fortunes of wool is that growers need to make a reasonable return for their effort so they can more confidently compete for land use and export opportunities.

One proposed remedy is the imminent merger of two farmer-owned entities, Hawke’s Bay-based Primary Wool Co-operative (PWC) with 1,400 owners, and Wools of New Zealand (WNZ) based in Christchurch with 780 shareholders.

Between them PWC and WNZ handle 37% of the wool clip. The rest is served

by PGG Wrightson, Carfield Primary Wool and other brokers in the wider wool ecosystem.

Until now there’s not been a strong enough body to capture the value before its absorbed further down the chain, says PWC director Hamish de Lautour.

The merged group proposes a fully integrated supply chain with sufficient clout to deal directly with manufacturers and deliver better returns to growers rather than shipping raw wool clip in a race to the bottom.

“The only way to get your story to the consumer is to own the brand as

24 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

close to the consumer as you can,” says de Lautour.

Hamish’s father was one of the founding directors of the East Coast Wool Co-operative set up in 1974 which morphed into PWC after underwriting the Dannevirke spinning mill.

PWC joint venture partners include Just Shorn luxury wool carpets, Hushaberry soft furnishings and rugs and Christchurch-based NZ Yarn which makes high quality spun yarns for the world’s carpet industry.

PWC recently acquired full ownership of Hastings-based broker and wool handler CP Wool and rescued the country’s last spinning company, Christchurchbased New Zealand Natural Fibres, from receivership in 2014.

Reboot strategy

Key to the strong wool reboot will be the ability of the merged entity to capture value for a range of wool, including crossbred clip, Merino and mid-micron wool from Corriedale sheep, and bulk supply several “woollen floor covering” manufacturers to create a more competitive product.

One of those pending export deals is with a carpet tile manufacturer.

“Carpet tiles are the floor covering of choice in the commercial environment, and in the UK that’s a massive £240m market,” says de Lautour.

Craig Hickson say claiming back the

traditional carpet market is a logical place to start, with Bremworth targeting “discerning buyers at the high end” and WNZ manufacturing carpet in Turkey, to compete with “solution dyed nylon” carpets.

However, getting beyond carpet will require “a multi-faceted approach across a broad range of products and market segments that can be consumed by a large number of people,” says Hickson, a founding director of WNZ and member of PWC. And there’s no quick fix. He says it could take 10 years to transition to the point where demand exceeds supply.

Philippa Wright has 45 years in the wool industry and reckons the big shift will come with changing consumer attitudes and better appreciation of “the relevance of wool as a natural, sustainable fibre which can help the planet”.

The Waipukurau-based wool broker doesn’t believe collective dealing with bulk wool will suddenly change the market, challenge the major manufacturers or bring the price down.

You can’t really compete on price “so Joe Blogg can buy a carpet again” when you are dealing with a quality product. She asks, what happens when the price of wool goes up? “To me it would be better to have an absolute premium product because there are people who can afford that.”

Scouring the options

An essential part of preparing most raw clip for export is the wool scourer who separates, processes, dries, presses, packs, stores and distributes.

Up until 1976 there were 28 scourers, but through mergers, acquisitions and financial failures there’s only one left; Napier-based New Zealand Wool Scouring with plants at Clive, Awatoto and Timaru.

After a drawn out Commerce Commission process, its monopoly status was approved, and a year ago its operating name became WoolWorks, signalling to the market it was time for a change.

“We couldn’t just sit around, waiting to see what’s happening we had to make some changes ourselves,” says CEO Nigel Hales.

WoolWorks is endeavouring to lead by example, adopting leading edge technology and global ‘best practice’, investing in R&D for wool by-products with international partners and improving carbon emissions and environmental sustainability.

Hales says the company is internationally competitive; even in highly subsidised countries, offers scouring tariffs three times lower than in England, and is geared for growth.

“We’ve proven it can be done if your business is set up right,” says Hales.

Made in NZ myth

Hales insists a brighter wool future depends on improved exports, local demand and a return to local manufacturing.

The significantly lower cost of manufacturing offshore has mesmerised the industry in the past but Covid-induced chaos in the global distribution network has exposed harsh realities.

China’s production is at half-mast and the Americas and Europe are only slowly re-opening. Hales drops a bombshell: the cost of a container from China has just gone from $5,000 to over $10,000.

He says wool is bulky and hard to transport in a manufactured form and international shipping prices aren’t helping. “Exporters are having a hell of a time ... I always wondered when the wheel would turn and we were forced to look at manufacturing back here in New Zealand.”

The majority of wool manufacturing is done at scale in Asian countries which comb, spin and produce yarn for Europe, America and New Zealand, which is partly why ‘New Zealandmade’ wool product remains so costly.

Philippa Wright isn’t sure local

manufacture will make a difference.

“Everything is so much more expensive here, including our wages and compliance costs.”

She agrees we need to consider new niche applications and get wool back into homes “architecture, buildings ... it only takes three bales of wool to carpet one big house”.

There are lots of “wonderful new ideas” but the best of them may require big financial investment and ideally stronger government support.

That, she suggests, may be a problem, if key people think the industry doesn’t have a long-term future.

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Filters and fertiliser

Her own innovation is “bouncy and soft” luxury pillows made in Christchurch for the home and hospitality industry filled with wool, crimped and carded into tiny balls or knobs like those in a bean bag.

She’s also 50% shareholder in a US business where a machine transforms our raw product into pillow fillings so they can say ‘made in the USA’.

Her other business dries, crushes and processes daggy wool into fertiliser tablets for companies like Tui to create pellets that retain moisture in the garden.

The list of wool innovations is impressive and goes well beyond clothing, bags, socks, rugs, hats and insulation.

Lanaco produces high-quality wool-fibre filters for medical, industrial and special purpose masks, home ventilation, air filters and vacuum cleaners.

It produced 70,000 reusable wool face masks for the New Zealand Olympic team and last year won a contract to supply NASA with wool filters for manned missions to the Moon and Mars.

Kiwi inventor Logan Williams developed biodegradable pellets, combining coarse wool with polylactic acid from corn starch, to replace plastic in injection moulding.

His company Keravos is working with the New Zealand Merino Company and Kiwi firms Action Plastics and Maisey Group making furniture, pots, crockery and other products.

And then there’s VIP Beds in Porangahau and KiwiWool based in Havelock North, both making customised wool pet beds, and the latter insulation products for commercial and domestic clients as well.

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One lucrative by-product from WoolWorks scouring operation is wool

Each office is independently owned and operated.

SHB Limited (licensed under the REAA 2008) MREINZ.

Photo: Tom Allan

grease, which is in high demand as a component in hair shampoo, make-up and pharmaceuticals.

It’s known as lanolin and they’re supplying a major cosmetic manufacturer in France who uses it in lipstick because it protects and hydrates the skin.

“New Zealand crossbred wool produces the world’s highest levels of cholesterol which our customers convert into natural vitamin D powder and crystals in different grades. It’s a carrier in medicines and one of the drugs you should be taking if you’re worried about Covid.”

Hales says food companies like MyFoodBag.co.nz are now using wool instead of polystyrene in their packaging.

He cites an Australian company that swapped out polystyrene boxes for New Zealand wool-lined cardboard boxes to send fish between cities. They grew their business 30% because the frozen fish lasted longer and could travel further.

Craig Hickson believes there’s plenty of room for expansion into traditional areas like quilts, bed toppers, tanned sheepskin for babies and children to sleep on and for medical use in hospitals.

Setting an example is Hawke’s Bay’s Big Save Furniture which purchased four beef and sheep farms, to ensure natural fibre for its products.

The company pays more than double

26 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

the current strong wool price for what becomes lining, coverings and filler for its beds and sofas because it’s flame retardant, biodegradable and ultimately reduces the environmental impact at landfills.

It recently imported specalised equipment to manufacture locally. Owning the supply chain and dealing directly with farmers means it can absorb extra cost rather than passing it to consumers.

More or less sheep

The recent Godfrey Hirst legal challenge to Bremworth Cavalier (30% owner of WoolWorks) claimed its wool carpet campaign failed to inform customers of the environmental damage of livestock farming, wool scouring and the chemicals used.

A counter argument might be that Godfrey Hirst also makes wool carpet and increased its take of Kiwi wool this year. It’s claimed sheep farming can be as sustainable and beneficial to the environment as forestry and an important part of land use diversity.

“Wool and its co-products need to play their part alongside beef and lamb to give a return that makes pastoral farming competitive with forestry in the hill country where most of our sheep are, and where tractors can’t go,” says Craig Hickson.

“It’s not sensible to think of our hill country completely covered in trees and the plains all covered in

horticulture and viticulture or apples, crops and grapes.”

Hickson insists sheep stimulate growth and sequester carbon through photosynthesis by continually chewing pasture. “Wool stores carbon, it’s biodegradable unlike plastic and has relatively long life in carpets so a sheep would be the equivalent of a tree once its harvested.”

While meat prices are expected to remain high, he says great opportunity lies in the “massive shift in attitudes toward wool and natural fibre” and our national flock may need to increase.

Philippa Wright doesn’t want fewer sheep on our paddocks and, like others, is concerned at the trend toward genetic breeds that shed wool, or crossbreeds with black fibre.

She says it’s important we don’t lose our advantage as one of the best strong wool producers in the world.

When the wool revival hits, Hamish de Lautour says breeders with no wool will wonder what hit them. “That’s an income stream they’re not going to have ... its second only in stupidity to pine trees when it comes to destroying rural communities.”

Sheep are dual-purpose animals, says Hickson, and it’s unwise for farmers to believe lamb prices will continue to grow fast enough to sustain land use against other options.

Matter of survival

Increased demand from carpet manufacturers, the proposed farmer-owned supply chain and other efforts to restore wool’s lost lustre are a matter of survival for woolgrowers struggling with a flaccid growth curve.

Like Hickson says, meat growers need wool to be strong so farmers and the industry can benefit from both.

While recent challenges including Covid have been “a hell of a shock”, Philippa Wright is cautious about claims the wool industry is broken or dying.

Despite not having an overarching representative body, she says wool is working well and simply needs the missing pieces that now seem to be fitting into place.

“We’ve had wool sales for 150 plus years and rarely have farmers not been paid. We have a testing regime and can sell and get paid through a global trading system with no major issues. That’s not broken.”

However, says the pressure is now on and while the industry has got used to being in the doldrums, she says “we have to pick ourselves up again”.

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Water solution or ‘playing god’?

Bridget Freeman-Rock looks at the case for MAR: trialling managed aquifer recharge in Central Hawke’s Bay

The last two years have been tough for Will Foley, a Central Hawke’s Bay sheep and beef farmer.

He’s had to “de-risk, to simplify” in a drying landscape. He’s now stopped farming over the mid-summer months altogether, destocking before Christmas and before the summer feed runs out. There’s more demand on water in the Ruataniwha catchment, less supply, and a trend of ever-less rain, which is “hugely worrying”.

Anecdotally, there hasn’t been the usual snowfall on the Ruahine Ranges; springs are not running, streams are drying up. “It’s scary,” he says.

Water supplying both Waipukurau and Waipawa townships comes from shallow wells beside rivers (effectively, surface water), while rural settlements like Ongaonga and Tikokino are on private bore supply, the bores often drying out now in summer. Yet CHB’s population is climbing, as property prices drive more people away from the main centres, with proposed largescale housing developments in the cards. Questions of water infrastructure for domestic use and town supply have become critical.

There’s not great equity, when it comes to water takes (with the first in, first served basis of allocation in the days when water was ‘bottomless’, concentrating the now-capped resource in the hands of a few irrigators). Over the last 20 years, groundwater allocations for irrigation and industry (drawn from the deep, confined Salisbury aquifer) tripled from just over 9 million cubic metres per year in 2001 to 29 million m3/ year, with allocation limits set at 28.5 million under Plan Change 6.

30 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Winter groundwater levels in that same period declined by 10-20cm annually (in the Forest Gate monitoring well, for example, groundwater levels have dropped 4 metres), a decline amplified by increasing groundwater takes over summer as conditions become drier and there’s less water in the landscape, which in turn further depletes the shallower systems.

Climate change projections for Central Hawke’s Bay is for higher-intensity rain events followed by prolonged, drier drought periods, which will dramatically change the ability of its communities to manage water.

Ecological habitats for native freshwater species like eel will be most vulnerable to the fluctuations.

By slowing water down (capturing surface water in times of high flows and releasing it through the groundwater system), it’s hoped, managed aquifer recharge (MAR) – to be trialled in the Ongaonga area pending consent – will help mitigate against some of these extreme weather variations, while rebalancing an out-of-kilter system.

“It’s no silver bullet for the district’s water needs,” says Will, who is also a Hawke’s Bay Regional Councillor. But he hopes MAR will help on a localised scale to restore waterways (creeks, wetlands, springs), in combination with water efficiency and smarter, climate-change adaptative, land-use practices.

Ruataniwha Basin

The CHB catchment is bounded in the west by the Ruahine Ranges and foothills, which provide the headwaters for both the Tukituki and Waipawa Rivers, and to the east by limestone hills on

“We are seeing less and less water in our waterways. Springs are not running, streams are drying up – it’s scary.”

WILL FOLEY, CHB FARMER AND HBRC COUNCILLOR

the coast, and includes 10 surface-water sub-catchments. The Ruataniwha Basin that sits beneath is effectively a closed groundwater system – hydrogeologist Clare Houlbrooke describes it as like a bath, with the two rivers that exit it as the plughole.

Within that basin are two aquifer zones: the shallow Young Gravels aquifer, which is fed by the Waipawa River and supplies baseflow to the springs and streams in the eastern side through the upwelling of groundwater flow, and the deeper Salisbury aquifer, which contains a more confined and older groundwater system (some of the water here is 150-200 years old). Pretty much all groundwater abstraction in the catchment is from the Salisbury.

The proposed three-year MAR pilot will take water (about 170 litres per second) during peak flows from an infiltration gallery from within gravels below the Waipawa River, where it comes out near SH50. “The water here is beautiful,” says Clare, “relatively low sediment, low nutrient.”

It will then be piped a couple of kilometres away to a site on private land (which will be made accessible and viewable to the public), where it will be channelled through a series of constructed wetlands and infiltration

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 31

“The aims of this aquifer recharge project are around restoring spring-fed streams, to stabilise the system and ensure it is sustainable and in balance.”

CLARE HOULBROOKE, HYDROGEOLOGIST

galleries (literally just a hole in the ground filled with sands and gravels), to settle out any sediments. About 100 L/s will be released into the shallow aquifers, while 70 L/s will be pumped some 70 metres down into the deeper aquifer through what’s termed an ASR (aquifer storage recovery) bore, half of which will be drawn back out in summer – or at least that’s the possibility being explored.

Tom Skerman, manager of HBRC’s Regional Water Security Programme, explains: “So, you’re building up the capacity over winter and spring, and

32 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

then in the drier months, the water that’s sitting in the shallower aquifer effectively creates a mound that slowly discharges, supporting the nearby, lowland streams and springs. Hopefully you’ve increased the capacity of the deeper aquifer where most people access water, and we’re going to test to see how much we can pull out.”

What happens with the pilot’s extracted water is yet to be determined, but there’s opportunity to demonstrate future farming practice, whether that be something regenerative, says Will Foley, or trialling new climate-resilient crops. “People will need to see results; we will need to prove the concept.”

the assumption the Ruataniwha dam would be completed, not ‘fall over’, and involves targeted investigations where the pressures are across the CHB and Heretaunga Plains.

When the Provincial Growth Fund (now called Kānoa) came into play, HBRC made a comprehensive set of applications across four projects to speed up delivery, all of which were successful, including the 3D mapping project, which has been mapping the region’s aquifers, and the MAR pilot.

“Our goal for the region is to have long-term, climate-resilient supplies of freshwater for all,” says Tom Skerman, “but it’s the ‘for all’ bit that’s the really challenging part.

Supply and demand

HBRC’s water security programme was set up to guide decision-making around how to spend money that had been earmarked many moons ago for water storage on the Ngaruroro under

ABOVE: The proposed trial for Managed Aquifer Recharge in Central Hawke’s Bay. Water will be captured from the Waipawa River, filtered through a series of constructed wetlands and basins, and stored in the underground aquifers. Graphics courtesy of Hawke’s Bay Regional Council.

“With growing cities, growing industries, a drying climate and no more water to be allocated – the regional water security assessment and common sense tells us we’re a fully allocated system – we can safely say there’s going to be a gap between supply and demand at some stage in the future. The question becomes, how can you close the gap? And, what are your solutions on the supply side?

“In the absence of solutions, it becomes really very tricky; then all your interventions come down to demand: water rationing, re-allocation, water-use prioritisation, etc. This pilot is essentially to look if MAR can be part of the supply solution.”

Groundwater Replenishment Scheme (GRS) is the term used to describe a network of MAR sites across a catchment, and in its design to capture, distribute, recharge and recover water would require systems-thinking conceptualisation. “The purposeful recharge of the groundwater supplies could help to mitigate, enhance and potentially lead to a more holistic and sustainable water management model,” the pre-feasibility assessment noted, though at this point a largescale, joined-up GRS is not a focus of the MAR trial.

Tom Skerman is at pains to point out that MAR is not ‘dam by stealth’: “Aquifer recharge can never be an alternative to the Ruataniwha dam, which would have been absolutely, intergenerationally transformative (good or bad, depending on where you stand) for the whole community. If the MAR pilot shows promise, I am sure there will be a demand for it, but the nature of it being localised and networked, it probably lends itself to community groups applying it, with tailored rationale to their area and need.

I can conceive of a number of models going forward.”

And, theoretically, MAR could work in conjunction with other water storage approaches.

Restoring balance?

MAR is used around the world (in 1,300 or so locations), mainly as a filtering-type system, in places where there’s pressure on water resources.

“It’s new to New Zealand but it’s not a new technique,” says Clare Houlbrooke, who attended an international MAR conference in Spain just before lockdown 2020, and shares multiple examples of where it’s been innovatively applied for years.

It is not without controversy,

however. Research published in February this year on the HindsRingatu plains, Canterbury, shows more efficient water-use for farming has reduced groundwater levels and increased groundwater contamination, backing international findings.

The Hinds MAR scheme (which Clare has also worked on) is an attempt to address these consequences, and while ‘diluting polluting nitrates coming off farms’ was one of its aims, this wasn’t meant to replace on-farm management of nutrients – a point somewhat lost in media reports and on the chairman of the project himself.

Freshwater ecologist, Mike Joy, has been pretty damning about MAR, calling the technology a “public relations trick”, an attempt to “play God”, and environmentally risky. That view is similarly voiced by Ngāti Kahungunu’s director of environmental and natural sciences, Ngaio Tiuka. He argues that taking water from rivers and putting it underground is essentially “robbing Peter to pay Paul”, and benefits irrigators.

Environmental concerns over MAR include the potential for surfacewater contaminants to be introduced into pristine water (remember, some of the water in the Salisbury is 200 years old), and the downstream ecological

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 33

“There are two ways to store water: you can store water above ground in a bucket, or you can use the ground as a sponge to store water below.

What aquifer recharge does is try and mimic nature. It deliberately takes high-flow water during winter and then returns that to the shallow or deeper aquifer.”

TOM SKERMAN, HBRC’S REGIONAL WATER SECURITY PROGRAMME MANAGER

Photo: Tom Allan

effects (as yet unknown) of tinkering with the system. Philosophically, there’s concern that it’s a techno-industrial approach that treats water merely as a resource and not a taonga, and that it’s our relationship to water and the more-than human world that needs recharging.

But Clare insists the intention for CHB is restoring balance, as well as water storage, and any freshwater pumped into the groundwater system (at this stage, a relatively small slug) will be stringently tested; it’s a completely different scenario to Canterbury, under a unique set of conditions.

When water is introduced into the groundwater system, it dissipates out into a bubble. “For it to mix, be naturalised (i.e. more like the ambient groundwater),” she explains, “it has to move through the groundwater system, which happens very slowly – in the

34 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

space of months, from what we’ve seen in Gisborne – but how long is something we’ll be watching closely in this pilot.

“The pilot is about demonstrating what’s possible at this point and how that system’s responding. It will allow us to understand the whole system better; to understand some of those other connections (the interlink between surface water and groundwater), while also taking the community along on the journey.”

Unintended consequences

So, what about unforeseen implications when considering ki uta ki tai (the connectivity of water from the mountains to the sea)? Is there a risk we mess up the whole aquifer?

I am reminded of the fact that the historic solution to flooding on the Heretaunga Plains (building channels and stop-banks to contain rivers) has

exacerbated the increasingly gnarly issue of sediments flushing out into the ocean; while ‘reclaiming’ land for urban development and agriculture led Hawke’s Bay to lose 98% of its vital wetlands, which hold and filter water in the landscape.

An even more pertinent example is the open stockwater races (which carried water from streams and rivers to farms), once prevalent across the Ruataniwha catchment, but closed 2001-2004 due to concerns about potential discharge contamination and due to their overall ‘inefficiency’.

Ironically, it was this very inefficiency that helped buoy baseflows to streams and rivers in the eastern part of the catchment, as water leaked from the races into the shallow gravel aquifer beneath the plains in what scientist Clare Houlbrooke terms “incidental recharge”, and which irrigation ‘efficiency’ effectively put a stop to, to the ecosystem’s detriment.

By way of answer, Tom hands me Elizabeth Kolbert’s latest book, Under a White Sky, about “people trying to solve problems created by people trying to solve problems”. The book explores what’s at stake if we don’t intervene in an unfolding human-made disaster (climate breakdown) – she asks, is that even an option? – along with the accompanying, paradoxical risk of unintended, uncontrolled-for consequences.

Like the book’s engineers, scientists and ‘atmospheric entrepreneurs’, Tom believes we don’t have much choice but to try: “We face some stark facts. There is not going to be more water; we’ve reached the limits of what the environment is going to give us naturally.”

Worse, according to NIWA’s (2018) hydrological projections, Hawke’s Bay rivers will be among the most affected by climate change in New Zealand, with the Tukituki River and the Wairau in Gisborne topping their list of most vulnerable waterways.

Under HBRC’s Regional Water Security Programme there will be a series of water projects aimed at ‘water security’, of which the MAR pilot is but one. For Tom, the programme’s “a climate-change adaptation programme – there’s no question of that”. It’s not a mitigation piece of work, it’s not to improve water quality (there are plans and regulations in place for that), it’s about protecting baseline flows and ensuring we have water in the first place, he says, and that’s going to require interventions.

Tom concedes that environmental

groups like Forest & Bird are highly sceptical of interventions, but believes it’s unrealistic to just focus on cutting demand, and the regional council has to cater to a broader community of needs.

He assures me there will be seven monitoring bores, a heap of science applied at every juncture (“We’re going to test the bejesus out of it”), along with the principles of Te Mana o Te Wai. The latter being the newest iteration of the National Freshwater Policy, which is about lifting standards of care for freshwater in step with Māori values, under a hierarchy of obligations in which the environment comes first, followed by human health and wellbeing.

The team is currently in process of engaging with local hāpu and iwi and, if mana whenua are willing, will be setting up a “strong” cultural monitoring programme alongside.

“It is a trial, it is about monitoring, we’re not just standing this up.”

He would like sceptics to keep an open mind.

“Let’s give it a chance and see what the environmental benefits are, because there are good reasons for doing MAR, not least providing more consistent flows to water bodies that are struggling,” including four nearby wetland systems close to the proposed site.

He cites former HBRC chair Rex Graham’s talking point on water security earlier this year, “All levers will have to be pulled”. MAR is not looking to be the techno-fix to Central Hawke’s Bay’s looming water crisis. But is touted as just one lever, or one possible – ‘if we’re lucky’ – solution, amongst others.

MAR in a nutshell • The MAR trial is proposed for a site on private land between Ongaonga and Tikokino. It will take water from gravels below the Waipawa River near SH50 at 170 litres per second during peak winter flows; filter it through constructed wetlands and shallow basins, allowing most to seep into the shallow aquifer system, before pumping a portion of it (up to 70 L/s) 70 metres down into the confined aquifer.

• The idea is to build up local water reserves (or a ‘mound’) in the shallow aquifer, that will feed nearby lowland streams and springs over dry summer months, while increasing capacity in the deeper aquifer, where most of CHB’s groundwater is accessed.

• Only 25% of the water taken for the pilot is intended to be ‘recovered’ (as in, used for other purposes), and how that will be utilised is still to be determined.

• The goal of the pilot is to test whether MAR is a viable tool for managing water security in Central Hawke’s Bay; to understand better the interface between surface and groundwater systems; and to demonstrate the concept for community and stakeholders.

• The Regional Council is currently engaging with mana whenua and, while a partial consent has been lodged, a full application for a 5-year consent has yet to be made.

Once the pilot is up and running, a plethora of data is expected be gathered within 2-3 years.

• The pilot will cost around $1 million to construct and monitor, paid with co-funding from Kānoa (the government’s Provincial Growth Fund).

Set your sights.

And let’s get started. navigatoraccounting.co.nz

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 35

Future Farming TO M B E L FO R D

Growing carbon in Hawke’s Bay soils Our nation’s farmers have a key role to play in how New Zealand addresses climate change and contributes our constructive part in mitigating the global predicament. Thus a topic of great interest to New Zealand farmers these days, especially those raising livestock, is whether carbon can actually be ‘grown’ in the soil and used to offset harmful climate-warming emissions.

Leading edge farmers using regenerative farming practices insist this can be done. Everyone from the Government to Beef+Lamb NZ to Greenpeace is looking for the evidence.

Here in Hawke’s Bay, dairy farmers John and Donna Kamp – working with farm consultants Phil Schofield and Paul Smith – are on that path and beginning to show promising signs. John and Donna have shouldered most of the cost involved in this research, with some support for the sampling analysis from the Hawke’s Bay Future Farming Trust.

Here’s what they’re up to.

BayBuzz: John, can you give us an overview of your farming operations?

John: Donna and I are currently farming on three farms totalling 1,080 hectares in Patoka – ‘The Incline’ (farmed regeneratively since 2007 and organically since 2016), ‘Huiarangi’ (purchased in 2016 and now farmed regeneratively and organically), and ‘Raumati’(purchased in 2019 and undergoing organic conversion).

The farms are in close proximity and share soils, geology and climate. They also share a prior history of intensive farming employing chemical ‘best practice’ as prescribed by conventional agribusiness.

I’ve had a ‘career’ in farm renovation since 1988. In 2007 prompted by ill health and a growing recognition of the links between soil, environmental, animal and human health, we decided to adopt a biological/regenerative approach. Phil Schofield has been our soils mentor since 2008, with Paul Smith now involved as well.

36 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

BayBuzz: What are you trying to achieve that prompted this research project?

John: We see soil microbiology as the basis of healthy living soil and the foundation of productive pasture and livestock. We believe our regenerative practices will add to our soil carbon stocks, mitigating against climate change, improving water infiltration and retention, and yielding more profitable farming.

Paul Smith: Phil and I had been looking for an opportunity to measure soil carbon stocks on grazing farms that had different pasture management, but were essentially the same in other respects – soils, contour and climate.

When John bought Raumati it presented a really great opportunity to do this. His three farms represent a progression from high input farming to lower input regenerative farming.

We don’t have good research on this in New Zealand and, given that soils contain more carbon than the atmosphere and vegetation combined, it’s important that we learn more about how our farming practices effect this vast resource.

We know that increased carbon in the soil has to come from CO2 in the air. We also know that soils with higher carbon hold more water and nutrients. If it can be shown that some farming practices improve soil carbon then we can use this to sustainably produce great food and help save the planet at the same time, and we won’t need to plant trees on good, productive farmland.

BayBuzz: Describe the basic framework for this project – what did you set out to measure, why and how?

Phil Schofield: We were seeing differences in the soil health, pasture quality and pasture root length and density on the three farms so we wanted to see if those differences could correspond to differences in the soil carbon levels.

Paul Smith

Paul has been working for years on verified soil carbon measurement methodology and was a co-author on MPI’s newly minted Technical Paper on soil carbon benchmarking. He enlisted the leads on this paper, Paul Mudge and Stephen McNeill from Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research, to help with the sampling design and make sure it was done properly. We measured Total Nitrogen stocks as well because it is environmentally important to know if soils can hold more nitrogen.

36 individual sites were sampled on each farm. Each core was divided into one 0 to 300 mm depth sample and a 300 to 600 mm depth sample making a total of 72 samples analysed per farm.

The bulk density, total N and total C was measured for each sample at the Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research lab in Palmerston North.

BayBuzz: And so what have you found? What’s the headline out of this?

Paul: Keeping in mind that Incline has been under ‘regenerative’ management for at least the last 10 years, Huiarangi for 5 years, and Raumati about 12 months, we see significant differences in soil carbon and nitrogen, as this table indicates. Total C and Total N stocks are expressed in tonnes per hectare for the full 600 mm depth.

Overall there is 64 tonne/ha more carbon and 5.2 tonne/ha more nitrogen

The general consensus is that NZ’s soil carbon levels are high and therefore we won’t be able to improve them; these results put that in doubt.

PAUL SMITH

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 37

Incline 10 years regenerative farming

Huiarangi 5 years regenerative farming

Raumati 1 year regenerative farming

Soil Carbon tonnes/ha

250

201

186

Soil Nitrogen tonnes/ha

21.7

18

16.5

in the top 600 mm of the soil at Incline compared to Raumati and the C and N levels at Huiarangi are in between Incline and Raumati. The soil carbon levels we found are fairly high by world standards. Soil carbon concentrations of approximately 8% (Incline) and 5.5% (Raumati) were found in the top 300 mm of the soil profile on the farms.

The general consensus is that NZ’s soil carbon levels are high and therefore we won’t be able to improve them; these results put that in doubt.

I wasn’t expecting that we would find so much more nitrogen held in the Incline soils, especially as no fertiliser nitrogen has been applied for over 10 years.

Phil: The differences we have found in soil carbon levels and total N levels on the farms correspond to our field observations. Visual soil assessment (VSA) methods show us that Incline has a deep pasture root system. Compared to Incline the soils at Raumati are more compact, less porous and there are fewer earthworms present. The VSA measurements at Huiarangi are not as good as we find at Incline and better than at Raumati.

BayBuzz: What are the farming practices that account for these results?

John: We’re implementing four basic practices, our version of regenerative farming: • Do no harm: Use no synthetic fertilisers or chemicals that can compromise microbial life or animal health. Organically approved fertiliser is applied to achieve mineral balance and stimulate microbial life.

• Encourage pasture diversity: Every plant species uniquely adds to the complexity and proliferation of soil microbial life (i.e. soil health)… the same way eating a diversity of healthy whole foods forms the basis of a functioning human microbiome to promote good health and vitality.

• Intensive grazing with ruminant animals: High stock density with frequent shifting and long pasture recovery time.

38 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

his replicates the deep soil buildT ing processes of the North American bison herds and wildebeest herds of Africa (kept compact by predators) that grazed, trampled, defecated, urinated and salivated their way across abundant grasslands adding fertility, composting in situ, re-inoculating and stimulating soil microbiology as they went. Fenced paddocks with water supply replace the predator effect in the NZ pastoral setting.

• A ll grass farming with minimal soil disturbance: This reduces soil loss through wind and rain and encourages mycorrhizal fungi growth – filaments that bridge soil microbes to plants, creating a resource trading ‘internet’. The plant offers photosynthetically derived sugars (from atmospheric carbon) in exchange for essential minerals delivered by the soil’s wide fungal network.

The result of these practices is in situ composting and carbon trading, sequestering carbon deep in the soil as stable humus … the essence of live healthy soil.

BayBuzz: How conclusive are these findings?

Paul: We wish we had gone deeper; we found bigger differences between the farms at depth than expected. We were trying to keep control of costs as we didn’t have any funding to start with, and still only have lab costs covered.

Comparing the farms at this stage is tricky, the benchmarking process is really designed to be the first stage in a monitoring process that measures soil carbon change on a set piece of land over time. We will know more about how the farming practices are affecting soil carbon when we have done another couple of rounds of measurements. We are hoping to be able to retest these farms in 2023 and 2026 so that we can pick up trends and quantify the rates of soil C and N sequestration.

That said, the farms are close together and so have the same climate, they have similar contour, the same soil type, and, because of the

extensive VSA monitoring that Phil and I have done on a number of neighbouring farms over the last 10 years, we have some confidence that the topsoil depths would have been fairly similar across them when they were all sheep and beef farms. The data set was also very tight, with clear differences between the farms. I think we can say that the results are indicative, they give us a good “heads up” of what is happening.

In the meantime we hope to do some soil C testing on farms that neighbour the three farms we have benchmarked.

This will help shed light on whether the differences we have found are due to historic soil differences or are resultant from the pastoral farming system being employed.

BayBuzz: So what are the implications of your findings?

Paul: Finding that there is 64 tonne/ ha more soil carbon on Incline than on Raumati, on soils that are likely to have had similar levels prior to conversion, is nationally important.

To put this into perspective, it converts to 235 tonnes of CO2-e, or roughly the same as a pine forest would accumulate in 8 years. If we can show, with more measurements over time, that these sorts of changes are due to the farming methods employed then the industry can start to incorporate some of these methods into best practice and begin to recognise gains as GHG offsets.

If we were able to achieve even a small portion of this change over NZ’s pastureland it would have a huge impact on our GHG profile. The great thing with soil carbon, compared to forestry, is that you can claim the GHG benefit, keep the carbon in the ground where is improving the water holding and nutrient holding ability of the soil, and keep growing low GHG food on the land – there aren’t too many downsides.

Phil: In addition, Incline has 5.2 tonnes per ha more nitrogen present in the soil (humus complex) than Raumati.

If the different management systems

“This study offers very positive news for pastoral farmers. The benchmarking shows that we can have big differences in soil C in NZ soils under pastoral farming management.”

PHIL SCHOFIELD

John Kamp and Phil Schofield

employed on these farms for the last 10 years has resulted in the observed differences in soil nitrogen then a very significant environmental benefit can be obtained by holding more N in the soil rather than losing it to groundwater or having it volatilise to N2O, a potent greenhouse gas. This increased

N, bound to the soil organic matter and derived entirely through natural processes (no N fertiliser is used) is available to support dairy production with no detriment to the environment.

Phil: This study offers very positive news for pastoral farmers. The

benchmarking shows that we can have big differences in soil C in NZ soils under pastoral farming management.

There is a strong indication from our historic soil quality monitoring that managing pastures using regenerative farming methods can result in soil carbon sequestration and Nitrogen attenuation at rates that are highly significant from an environmental management viewpoint. We plan to continue the research so that we can establish whether NZ pastoral farmers should have soil carbon projects where they can use the C sequestered as an income stream or an offset in the ETS. BayBuzz: John, what happens next for you on these farms?

John: The benchmarking results very closely match what we expected from our visual soil assessments and will enable us to monitor ongoing changes over time. We believe that Raumati, starting from a lower soil carbon base and being farmed regeneratively for the shortest period should record the most dramatic changes.

The outcome will be largely determined by the daily grazing management of Jeremy and Sheree Wapp and their staff who contract milk on all three farms.

phone 06 833 6655 email office@louvretec.com free no obligation quote & site visit

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Retractable opening roof creating the ultimate outdoor room

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 39

Illustration: Brett Monteith

Good for the planet is good for business Political update

by Tom Belford

Most BayBuzz readers know I’ve served two terms on the Regional Council, as well as losing two bids for re-election, most recently just this past September in the by-election to fill Rex Graham’s vacated seat.

So I do have some insights into the local election process which I offer in the first part of this article, and then move on to something probably more exciting … the commitments to environmental sustainability and ‘decarbonisation’ that some of Hawke’s Bay’s leading companies are beginning to make in the face of climate change.

Net loss – 1,885

Let me begin by acknowledging that losing an election campaign rests almost entirely on the shoulders of the losing candidate(s). I won 3,043 votes, but was beaten by 1,885 votes. My job was to get about 5,000 votes and I didn’t.

One can point to anything from poor campaigning to personal idiosyncrasies – too old, male, American, ponytail – to my repugnant views on issues as the reasons. Personally, I regard only the last of these as a relevant reason to oppose someone. I’ll come back to that.

But first some issues we should all consider regarding the process and ourselves as voters, because our local elections will soon be replayed. Sour grapes? No, I would have raised these issues regardless of the outcome.

First, where are the voters? Out of 42,533 eligible voters, only 10,372 (or less than a quarter) voted in the recent by-election. In the previous two HBRC elections, nearly 17,000 voted, still roughly only 45% of those eligible.

The Regional Council makes decisions that are vital to the health of our environment and the sustainability of our regional economy, particularly its agricultural sector, and the HBRC is increasingly ‘in the face’ of its sister councils on environmental matters.

The stakes are high for the region’s residents, rates being the least of it.

But most voters are clueless about

all this, and so in this recent election 75% of them just sat it out. Too many residents choose not to be voters, preferring to be Facebook whingers. That’s not the fault of the candidates.

We candidates put up heaps of billboards, distributed campaign flyers, mobilised volunteers, reached out to support networks and endorsers, bought ads, and pushed our messages out via videos, photo opps and statements through social media.

In contrast, the mainstream media – aka Hawke’s Bay Today – did virtually nothing to examine the candidates and their views. Apparently HBT thought the election was trifling. They organized one video interview (translated into a print article) and one follow-up article focusing on election procedures as opposed to candidates and issues.

Miss the paper those two days and you missed the campaign. No forum; not even a questionnaire to fill out on the issues. No examination of what the candidates were (or were not) saying or their qualifications.

Radio Kidnappers did its bit, but with far less reach, with candidates interviewed by Andrew Austin.

Shouldn’t we expect more from HBT, the community’s (proclaimed) principal news organ? They had only 2.5 candidates to cover and an extra two weeks to do so, courtesy of the Regional Council staff.

Which brings me to the strange process itself.

First, a candidate filed and then almost immediately sought to withdraw. Not a naïve individual from outside the political arena, but a staffer working for the Labour MP. But that candidate remains on the ballot and secures 2,361 votes, some of whom would be unaware the candidate had ‘withdrawn’ and others aware but nonetheless exercising their right to knowingly make a political statement of some sort.

This candidate has never publicly explained his behaviour, nor has he

apologized to the public for confounding the democratic process.

Meantime, HBRC’s elections officer, citing inability to remove a ‘non-candidate’ from the ballot, then decided to extend the election window by two weeks on the basis that our local lockdown impeded the return of mail ballots. Having made that decision, little was done to communicate it. So, 34,498 voters (42,533 eligible minus the 8,035 who had voted by the original deadline) sat for two weeks staring at a ballot indicating the election was actually over on 9 September and that three viable candidates were on offer.

Not a high point in election management or integrity.

One hopes HBRC will examine its performance, learn from it and possibly pursue changes in the responsibilities it manages. One can only speculate about whether these process glitches affected the outcome.

As I said, it was my job to win the votes – they were there to be had – and I didn’t succeed.

Instead 4,928 voters, about 12% of those eligible, gave their vote to the winning candidate. Some of those would be aware voters, who knew my views on the issues and – at odds with those – made an informed choice ‘against’. No problem, that’s my baggage to carry.

Some would be unfamiliar with both candidates and voted on some other basis … message, gender, friend’s recommendation, whatever.

In the worst case, some would be in the category represented by Facebook denizen Rick Robson, who wrote: “You’re all shit Tom, there’s one thing you care about and that’s you!!” A comment immediately ‘Liked’ by fellow citizens Simon McGlashan, Robert Rae, Anne Smith, Duncan Lennox, Lynette Hume, Kerrin Fair and Dawson Bliss. More dispassionate Facebookers merely told me to “piss off”.

I don’t know how many other candidates for local office in Hawke’s

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 41

Bay have been told on a public platform they were “all shit”, but it might explain why few qualified hands go up to stand at election time.

In any event, the result was that a candidate with no prior engagement in or contribution to the HB community and no experience with the environmental challenges that form the core of HBRC’s responsibilities – but perhaps otherwise capable – was elected. That’s democracy.

And in barely eight months, it will all happen again, when nominations for local body candidates (and ‘non-candidates’) begin! With the added complications of Māori wards (Hastings, Napier, Regional Council) and shifting electoral boundaries.

Good luck to the democratic process!

Net Zero

The news on the climate front is more exciting.

Not because we’re reducing emissions in Hawke’s Bay or NZ, however. The latest data from Stats NZ say Hawke’s Bay emissions rose 1.2%, driven by agricultural emissions. These were partially offset by a fall in household emissions – the majority of which are transport emissions.

Instead, because major economic players in our region are stepping up to the challenge, and they are probably the tip of the iceberg.

Driving this is not some green utopianism, although for sure these business decision-makers ‘care’ … and some with passion. Instead, rational assessment of future business prospects is the cause – demanding consumer expectations; matched by regulatory change; cost-reduction possibilities from less waste of all sorts of inputs, from fuel to water to materials throughout the product life-cycle; and in many cases, recognition that ‘less is more’ means higher profits.

Reading the winds, forward-looking business navigators are making economically driven practice changes while happily flying under the flag of ‘we’re doing our bit to save the planet’. Whatever the motivational mix, we’ll take it.

Here’s just a first glimpse of what’s happening in Hawke’s Bay. Napier Port – aiming for net zero emissions by 2050.

At Napier Port, carbon emissions in 2020 (to September) were 8,341 tonnes, down from 8,428 tonnes in the same 2019 window. The Port says: “In order to be sustainable, it’s important

42 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

for Napier Port to proactively manage our carbon footprint.”

Gains come from operational efficiencies like more fuel efficient forklifts, storing containers differently, transitioning to EVs, converting to LED lighting, repurposing waste bark from logs to mulch (in partnership with local firm BioRich).

These climate-focused changes fall within a broader Sustainability Strategy the Port adopted this past August, with these elements: • aiming for zero net emissions by 2050 • promoting healthy reefs and clean oceans locally • running community projects and good neighbour programmes • protecting marine and bird life • continuing to build a workplace that embraces diversity and cultural values • adopting clean energy solutions • minimising waste or duplication of resources Says Port chairman Alasdair MacLeod: “As a company that plays an important part in regional growth and prosperity, Napier Port embraces the opportunity to take a leading role in achieving a better and more sustainable future for all.”

Silver Fern Farms – zero carbon Angus beef SFF was the first red meat company in NZ to adopt a sustainability programme and to verify its carbon footprint and set an emission reduction target — total GHG emissions this year were 13% lower than last year and 20% lower than three years ago.

Their target set in 2020: 30% reduction on 2005 levels of the GHG emissions intensity of operations per tonne of product before 2030; and 10% reduction of energy use per kg of product produced. So far energy use is down 7.7%. And since 2017, 6% less fossil fuel used per kilogram of product.

Its efforts include substantially cutting its coal use in processing – onehalf by 2023, by two-thirds by 2025, and ending it entirely by 2030. Coal will be replaced by electricity and biomass. Other measures include smart lighting, hot water system management and overall water use reduction.

Chief executive Simon Limmer exhorted SFF’s shareholder/supplier conference recently: “Consumer concerns are increasing with respect to soil health, emissions, biodiversity, agricultural intensity, water quality,

and the resilience and sustainability of the current food system. There is only one direction of travel for our industry and SFF wants to be out the front leading.”

What about that zero carbon Angus beef?

SFF will launch Toitū Net Carbon Zero Certified Beef into the US market later this year.

Working with AgResearch and Toitū Envirocare, SFF is completing a lifecycle assessment of its 100% Angus beef.

That assessment involves measuring the greenhouse gas emissions from production, shipping and consuming a kilogram of 100% Angus beef in the US, then working with its Angus suppliers to measure, report and reduce emissions. Emissions (methane) from the cattle will be accounted for by carbon removals by vegetation on the supplier farms.

Still a carbon offset arrangement, but coupled with the rest of SFF’s emissions and sustainability commitments, a comprehensive programme providing leadership for the sector.

Hawke’s Bay Airport – carbon net zero by 2030 Just like Napier Port, the airport’s commitment to reducing the carbon footprint of its operations involves a myriad of practice changes: • LED lighting • Choice of construction materials throughout refurbishment • High performance heat pump system • Reduced fuel use • Improved waste reduction and recycling Such changes – and rigorous measurement of them – have established HB Airport as the first regional airport in NZ to achieve an international standard – Airport Carbon Accreditation Level 2 – as the airport moves along an externally monitored pathway to carbon neutrality.

Beyond the ‘day-to-day’ practice improvements, the airport can fairly lay claim to the region’s most ambitious footprint-reducing project.

The airport recently completed a feasibility study and has decided to move forward to establish a 24.2 megawatt solar array. The project would be the first large-scale photovoltaic installation located on ‘airside’ land in New Zealand, enabling Hawke’s Bay Airport to be the first in NZ to be powered by solar energy.

For scale, the solar farm could produce enough electricty to power 5,0006,000 households a year, meeting the electicity needs of the airport itself and returning surplus electricity to the grid for sale to other on-site businesses.

The project even anticipates providing the capacity to ‘charge’ the regional electric planes – now on order by Sounds Air – that will fly into Hawke’s Bay before the decade is out ... requiring a 1MW charger.

HBAL chief executive, Stuart Ainslie says the solar farm is key to HBAL achieving its decarbonisation programme.

“It’s vital that Hawke’s Bay Airport work towards carbon neutrality so it can do it’s part in New Zealand reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

With that in mind, the solar farm will help HBAL easily achieve its goal of reaching net zero by 2030.”

[Sadly for our region, Ainslie, one of HB’s ablest CEOs, departs in December for an overseas step up.]

Not just for the biggies

These larger HB companies have the ‘luxury’ of resources to support cross-company work teams, specialist ‘sustainability’ staff and consultants.

But you don’t need to be big to be

climate benevolent.

Stewart Financial Group is a good ‘small firm’ example. That investment advisory firm has installed solar panels to meet its electricity requirements, switched to EVs, added charging stations, and advises its clients on ethical investing … a key aspect of which is looking at climate change mitigation and sustainability commitments of prospect companies.

We have no doubt many other HB companies are making sustainability changes that bear on our climate crisis.

BayBuzz will be reporting steadily on these and we welcome hearing about your company’s plans.

The commitment to change practices for the betterment of both the planet and the bottom-line extends to individual farmers and growers in Hawke’s Bay. Elsewhere in this magazine I report on the ambitions of local dairy farmers John and Donna Kamp to ‘grow’ soil carbon.

Their most advanced farm (in terms of regenerative practices) holds 64 tonne/ha more soil carbon than their least advanced. That converts to 235 tonnes of CO2-e, or roughly the same as a pine forest would accumulate in 8 years. The HB Future Farming Trust will be monitoring their further

progress and its huge implications for pastoral farmers country-wide.

Greenwashing?

Climate commitments are promises.

And promises need to be articulated with precision, their implementation then independently monitored and verified. Otherwise ‘greenwashing’ can creep in. Nick Stewart discusses this in his article.

In the examples given here, the companies involved have described the independent standards and measuring regimes they are working against and should be judged by. That provides reasonable assurance of credibility.

But we have the added benefit of them being our neighbours, operating right here in our back yard where we can see first-hand what is really going on (or not), hold their feet to the fire, and applaud or raise alarms accordingly.

And BayBuzz is committed to doing just that through our Project Net Zero.

We will be seeking out examples of Hawke’s Bay companies making clear sustainability – and specifically, greenhouse gas reduction – claims. We will assess and report on those plans and then monitor progress.

Stay tuned!

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 43

Helping an anxious child

One in five New Zealanders is likely to be affected by anxiety and depression by the age of 18. The impact of the pandemic is set to see numbers escalate. Abby Beswick speaks to parents whose children are struggling with anxiety and to those making a positive difference to their lives.

Lennox Ranford at Brick Buddies.

Story by Abby Beswick Lesley Ranford didn’t know her baby wasn’t like other children.

Like all first-time mums, she was caught up in the magical and sleepless haze of her firstborn, a son called Lennox. The Napier mum felt exhausted and out of her depth but assumed that was just part of the job.

It felt like Lennox cried nonstop for his first year, he struggled to sleep, had to be held constantly, didn’t register his mum’s voice and didn’t smile until he was five months old. “I thought that was my normal and I was the one that wasn’t coping,” she says.

It wasn’t until her midwife and Plunket nurse said there might be something else going on that Lesley and her husband Dean sought professional help.

Now 7, Lennox has been diagnosed as neurodiverse – suffering from severe anxiety, ADHD and sensory processing difficulties. They are labels more for other people, says Ranford. For them, it simply means there’s a lot more going on with Lennox and as a family, they are constantly problem-solving the unique challenges that come with their eldest son.

One of these has been biting. Lennox initially communicated by biting whoever was around him. “If he was frustrated, if he was angry, if he was happy, he bit,” says Ranford. This transitioned to constantly chewing his clothes and hands, which becomes increasingly aggressive the more anxious he’s feeling. They started using silicon necklaces for Lennox to chew but he was getting through one necklace a week, so they are now trialing chewing gum.

Lesley Ranford and sister Frances.

There have been other challenges.

Lennox shies away from other children; preferring to watch rather than interact.

He has an extreme fear of noise from others, but he makes a lot of noise. If he needs an escape, Lennox has earmuffs on hand in the car, house, at school and even in bed. Having a daily routine is important for making him feel secure and now that he has a large vocabulary, Lennox is able to express himself, which has helped hugely to ease his anxiety, says Ranford.

Since having her second and third sons, Quinn, 4, and Bentley, 2, Ranford has seen the “vast differences” from their brother. As babies, they slept, only cried occasionally, and were happy to be put down on the floor to play. Lennox has struggled to adjust to having siblings – a challenge the family still faces daily.

Moderate to severe anxiety disorders are the most common psychiatric illnesses affecting adults and children, according to Anxiety New Zealand.

Feeling anxious to a degree is normal for everyone, as these emotions help us stay safe and adapt to our environment. However, when levels of anxiety become severe or ongoing, they can put our mental and physical health at risk, making daily life difficult. For children and adults suffering from anxiety, it can significantly impact work, school and relationships. Many people with anxiety also develop depression.

Sensory solutions

Helping children like Lennox was the motivation behind Hawke’s Bay business Sensory Haven 4 Kids. After

“You know your child better than anyone else.

If you see your kid is struggling, you don’t back down, and until you’ve got a plan you don’t leave that room.”

LESLEY RANFORD

several years supporting special needs children and as social workers in schools, former colleagues Angela Howlett and Lynair Bergman launched the online shop in August 2020. It sells a range of products designed to provide comfort and security for children and adults who suffer from anxiety and other sensory processing difficulties, at affordable prices.

During their careers, the women frequently saw teachers and families struggling to support children who had anxiety, ADHD, autism, trauma and other difficulties. “I was seeing children with behavioural issues and teachers didn’t know what they were or what was causing them,” says Bergman. “These kids didn’t know how to regulate their emotions and they were going through school being disruptive and undiagnosed. It caused them heaps of anxiety.”

Affected children often became withdrawn, hypervigilant, or had angry outbursts, says Bergman.

From personal experience, the women knew how much relief sensory products could bring to these children and their families. However, after doing some research they found there were very few on the market and those available were expensive, putting them

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 45

“Xxx” XXX

“Children engage in magical and fantasy thinking all the time anyway, but in anxious children you’ll have that on steroids.”

FRAN COLLETT, PSYCHOLOGIST

Angela Howlett and Lynair Bergman. Photo: Florence Charvin

“These kids didn’t know how to regulate their emotions and they were going through school being disruptive and undiagnosed. It caused them heaps of anxiety.

LYNAIR BERGMAN

out of reach for many families. During the first national lockdown last year, Howlett and Bergman came up with an idea to set up a business that had the potential to change these families’ lives.

“We’re trying to make these products more available and create understanding about children so they get the help they deserve,” says Howlett.

There’s a vast range of items available on the website, from fidget tools to keep restless hands busy, to weighted items, sleep-support products, chewables, books, swings and calming sheets.

Among the top sellers are weighted toys that are tactile, have a deep calming effect and can be carried around to provide comfort, particularly when a child is in new situations. Compression sheets made out of lycra and cotton are also popular. They work like a tube, connected to the mattress, and provide a cozy place for the child to relax and

46 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

unwind. Similar to this are the body socks made from lycra, with a hole for the head, that provide a fun, tactile experience. Swings and hammocks create a safe, relaxing space for children when they’re feeling anxious.

Howlett and Bergman sell the products online to the public, and they also supply schools, the DHB and Oranga Tamarki, so they can reach as many children as possible who need them.

Since launch, business has been booming as more families than ever search for ways to support their anxious children. Since the pandemic they’ve noticed a growing wave of need. The women have both quit their day jobs to work on the business full-time, and connect with families who are struggling with anxiety.

Ranford “spent a fortune” sourcing and trying different sensory products before discovering Sensory Haven 4 Kids. Through them, she’s bought several items that have been hugely beneficial to Lennox, including weighted toys, fidgets, puzzles, sensory sock, apothecary sniff pots, stretch noodles and weighted lap pads. They have included several items in a sensory box Lennox keeps at school as a distraction when he’s feeling overwhelmed. “He loves all that stuff and it makes him feel so relaxed.”

To support other neurodiverse

children and their parents, Ranford and her sister, who also has a neurodiverse child, started a lego group called Brick Buddies. The community-funded project is held at the Napier Family Centre once a fortnight and everyone is welcome. Products from Sensory Haven 4 Kids are available for families to trial at the sessions.

The group has been a valuable place for families to connect and find support, says Ranford. “They understand where each other is coming from and the struggles. The kids just play with lego and we’ve seen some really cool moments of socialising.”

Having a child with anxiety or who is neurodiverse in any way, can be an isolating experience but you’re not alone. There are several resources available online, including guides for coping with Covid on the Anxiety New Zealand website.

Ranford urges parents to ask for help when you need it, to educate yourself about your child’s condition and to advocate for your child. “You know your child better than anyone else. If you see your kid is struggling, you don’t back down, and until you’ve got a plan you don’t leave that room.”

There is light at the end of the tunnel for Lennox and the thousands of other Kiwi kids struggling with anxiety, they just need help to find it.

Anxiety: what you need to know Hawke’s Bay psychologist Fran Collett specialises in working with children. She explains the causes of anxiety and how parents can support children who are suffering from it.

What is anxiety?

Anxiety is the body‘s natural response to stress. When those feelings don’t go away, become extreme for the situation or you can’t control them, it makes it hard to cope with daily life.

Causes

There are a number of causes of anxiety. It can be hereditary, but nurture also plays a significant role, says Collett.

One of the main triggers of anxiety in children is everyday instability. This can take many forms, such as a change in parents’ jobs, financial distress, changing houses or moving schools. This instability makes children feel like they have no control over their lives.

“Children are incredibly sensitive to the emotional tone in the family.” More chronic instability is caused by trauma such as neglect or domestic violence.

Signs

Signs of anxiety are varied and fall into three categories: physical, social and emotional. Physical signs are usually easy to see and these can be things such as chewing nails, pulling hair out, scratching skin on their body, complaining of tummy aches, sleep disturbance such as waking

regularly, nightmares or night terrors or going backwards in toilet training.

Behaviourally, children may also start collecting things as a way of controlling their environment.

Emotional changes are also quite easy to pick up on. Children with anxiety may become more gloomy and less playful. They worry more and ask more questions than usual. “It comes out as things like, ‘Mummy, will we have enough money for lunch tomorrow?’,” says Collett. There can also be wishful or magical thinking. “Children engage in magical and fantasy thinking all the time anyway, but in anxious children you’ll have that on steroids.” Children are simply using the best tools they have to cope, says Collett.

Socially, children with anxiety will do everything possible to be accepted and liked by their friendship group.

They may become over involved in social groups, even to their own detriment. This gives them a sense of control over their friendships and of belonging, when there’s a sense of instability in the home, says Collett.

Alternatively, children might disengage and become withdrawn. When you see your child disconnecting from the world, for example withdrawing from social activities, it’s an alarm bell.

How can parents help?

Provide security – The most important thing parents can do is make children feel secure, says Collett. “Parents and caregivers have to contain and control environments to create that sustained sense of security and stability.”

Connect – All children need connection. Get down to their level and talk to them in a way that shows you value them and what they have to say.

Actions speak louder than words – Especially for young children, the gesture of being with them speaks much louder than your words. Put down your phone and make time to be present with your children.

Normalise change – When there is a change in daily life children are always aware of it. Parents can play a big role in normalising the change and engaging in conversation with their children about what’s happening. Ask your children how they’re doing, what they’ve noticed that’s different and whether you can do anything to help? If they’re engaged in meaningful ways this helps them manage the change, says Collett.

Knowledge is power – In these uncertain times it can be hard to know how much information to tell your children. Collett advocates empowering your children with age-appropriate knowledge to help them understand what is happening. There are several free resources online to help children understand the pandemic.

Breathe – Doing controlled breathing exercises together are a powerful way to support anxious children. This regulates the nervous system and improves mindfulness. Cosmic kids yoga is another fun option that brings children into their bodies and helps to relieve stress.

Get help – Parents know their children best. If you’re concerned, seek professional help. Therapy is there to support and empower families.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 47

Photos by Florence Charvin

Wellbeing G R E T TA CA R N EY

Growing food for happiness, health & security Back in the day everyone had a garden. It was an essential of life.

Everybody grew at least one thing well and they used it to feed themselves and share with others.

The Hapī team were out in the paddock building our maara kai when BayBuzz phoned, so writing about our new vegetable garden seems appropriate.

The simple act of growing food epitomises everything that we are being called to do in the world right now.

Through the act of gardening, we sequester soil carbon, create food security and support nutritional health. We create community, we grow knowledge and we rediscover a concept of faith that is connection with our natural world.

Our Hapī maara kai was conceived in the first lockdown. We watched our young people really struggle with the Level 4 restrictions. They seemed to take the hardest mental hit as their natural inclination is to be out and about, socialising and engaging with the world. We realised that this whole lockdown business was the perfect opportunity to engage an otherwise reluctant generation into food production because it was their only ticket

out of the house. Bring on permanent Level 4! (just kidding) We have been observing a genuine rise in anxiety within our young people and I shared my concerns with Te Waka Kai Ora chair Geneva Hildreth who has a professional background in mental health. “Get them into the maara,” was her response. “Papa will heal them. It’s simple, they just need to get their hands in the earth.”

For our team of busy cafe workers being in the maara is literally a breath of fresh air. Bathing in vitamin D, slowing the pace of our work, sharing a moment of freedom from the pressure of working with the public, participating in an act of care and nurture – we

Once you get over the initial hurdles it just gets easier and easier and the most unexpected outcome is how happy it makes you feel.

all emerge from our time in the maara visibly restored.

Our maara kai has also connected us to the knowledge of an older generation.

Peter Alexander, the retired founder of Chantal Organics, and Biddy Ormond, the very much un-retired producer at Good Earth Organics, have mentored us closely to get our gardens up and running. Without their help we would have really struggled to know what to do next. It was a real blessing to just do what we were told! Chris Hull, retiring farmer at Hohepa and national producer of the biodynamic preps for over 30 years, is mentoring our development of composting systems and use of biodynamics. Clyde Potter, retiring producer extraordinaire of Epicurian Supplies, is passing on some of his equipment to help get us started. Even my father, a refusing to retire life-long sheep and cattle farmer, has come on board with irrigation solutions and a renewed enthusiasm for growing our own food.

Back in the day everyone had a garden. It was an essential of life.

Everybody grew at least one thing well and they used it to feed themselves and share with others. My family grew all their own potatoes and I would give a lot to eat a potato grown with the seed my Irish grandfather grew. When

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 49

As our producers have retired, we are often reduced to buying in organic vegetables from distributers in Auckland!

The shame!

we talk about food sovereignty this is it. The simple act of growing our own food and passing on the knowledge of how to do this through the generations is a declaration of political freedom and economic independence.

Growing a garden doesn’t come easily and we are at the beginning. Our mentors start talking about the white fly and mildew and I freak out about everything we are going to have to learn. But the reality is that we don’t really have a choice, this is something that we have to learn how to do. Our organic producers are retiring, and we need to step up to take their place.

As our producers have retired, we are often reduced to buying in organic vegetables from distributers in Auckland!

The shame!

Our mentors are helping us because they know how important it is that we can grow healthy safe food. Peter cites his belief that every organic grower needs to help at least one other grower to get themselves started. We have a feeling he has aspirations to leave a sea of growers in his wake and we are happy to be early uptakers.

They all talk about how nutritionally important it is to eat food that have been grown in healthy soils where the biology has not been destroyed by chemicals. “The earth is a living organism that needs to be nurtured,” says Clyde. “When cared for the soil naturally develops the microbiology that creates fertility and lifeforce. This is what we are eating.”

“It’s just so important to eat healthy food,” says Biddy. “And it’s easy,” she waves her hand, “so easy! You will be amazed how easy it will be. And you are going to love it! It is going to bring you so much pleasure.”

They all talk about how nutritionally important it is to eat food that have been grown in healthy soils where the biology has not been destroyed by chemicals.

Ironically, a decade ago when I had the opportunity to interview a host of our most successful organic farmers for Organics Aotearoa New Zealand, they all said the same thing, once you get over the initial hurdles it just gets easier and easier and the most unexpected outcome is how happy it makes you feel.

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 51

“ Competition is for losers” The Commerce Commission has examined the situation and concluded that there is not enough competition amongst New Zealand supermarkets.

PAUL PAYNTER

BayBiz

These are cozy cartels that don’t engage in vigorous competitive behavior that would make them all poorer. They don’t need to collude to do this, just to monitor their competitors’ prices, which you can now do on your smartphone in about 15 seconds.

I’m a supermarket addict. Almost always the first place I got when I get off the international flights I used to take, is to a supermarket. There is nothing that speaks to me more about the culture of a country than its food and supermarkets are endlessly fascinating.

It’s been a lifetime of visiting supermarkets here too, originally tagging along with my dad to meetings with Foodtown in the 1980s. Back then Foodtown were the kings of retail in Auckland and so much more impressive than what you saw in the provinces.

Foodtown is one of the banners of yore, along with Write Price, 3 Guys, Big Fresh, Woolworths and Price Chopper. Each of these was either abandoned as a format and rebranded or taken over by Foodstuffs (New World, Pak’nSave and Four Square) or Countdown.

The last of the acquisitions began in 2001 when Countdown sought to acquire Woolworths. The Commerce Commission approved the merger, and after various legal appeals it stood.

Twenty years on and the Commerce Commission has examined the situation and concluded that there is not enough competition amongst NZ supermarkets. The profit margins they reveal make it difficult to reach any other conclusion.

Where you have a small number of look-alike businesses that dominate a sector then there are always fingers being pointed at these companies. It’s a clear regulatory failure and one that can be seen with service stations, banks and supermarkets.

If you changed the sign on the door of these businesses, the customers probably wouldn’t notice. These are cozy cartels that don’t engage in vigorous competitive behavior that would make them all poorer. They don’t need to collude to do this, just to monitor their competitors’ prices, which you can now do on your smartphone in about 15 seconds.

The relationship of both suppliers and customers to the supermarket is based on the ‘balance of power’.

If you are Goodman Fielder, who supply bread brands Molenberg and Vogel’s, you are indispensable, and the supermarket actually likes that they’re relatively expensive products.

They are simply margin traders and make more money from selling more expensive lines. There are cheaper options but brand power, quality and consistency mean big brands do OK. If you’re a new bread maker, you better have either the cheapest bread offer or some deeply compelling new product.

If not the supermarkets and consumers don’t really need you and you’ll struggle to get on the shelf.

I know this as I supply Yummy

apples, which every supermarket wants and Paynter’s Cider, which nobody wants.

Supermarkets also present a ‘basket of goods’ conundrum. If you’re buying a pair of shoes it’s easy to compare and contrast the options, while a basket of perhaps 50 items from the supermarket is a much more complex proposition. It’s likely they have some excellent specials but may well markup other items to compensate for their loss of earnings. A consumer has options available to work out how much they spend on power, fuel or insurance, but in most cases won’t know what their food bill is until the checkout operator makes the announcement.

Land bankers

The only power the consumer wields is the ability to shop elsewhere. In truth we’re all either too lazy or too busy to bother, so we just pay the fine and get on with our lives.

Supermarkets know that only about 20% of customers can be lured by weekly promotions and that is more powerful in urban centres where the density of supermarkets allows this choice with minimum of inconvenience. I watch prices and you can generally get a better deal in Auckland than you can do in Hawke’s Bay as the competition is more intense.

Supermarkets don’t sell things so

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 53

Supermarkets don’t sell things so much as manage logistics and real estate. They will acquire land or establish covenants on properties such that competitive businesses can’t become established.

The supermarkets are just playing by the rules that currently exist. So, let’s change them ...

I’m always slow to cry ‘Regulate!’ but with only two major retailers it would seem necessary.

much as manage logistics and real estate. They will acquire land or establish covenants on properties such that competitive businesses can’t become established.

There are many examples of this in Hawke’s Bay. When Countdown acquired Woolworths they were left with two stores within a stone’s throw of each other in central Napier. They were never going to sell one as, at the time, Foodstuffs had no central city stores and Countdown were keen that their local monopoly remained.

Havelock North is the same, where Foodstuffs have a local monopoly with New World, but a larger store has been in works for years. They purchased the Nimon site in Martin Place some years ago, but nothing has happened there.

They now own the Tumu ITM site on Havelock Road where a new store will likely be built. One thing you can be certain of is that they will not allow Countdown to become established on either their old site, or in Martin Place.

They’d rather turn them into carparks that let this happen.

Supermarkets’ competitive advantage lies in their store locations because we all live busy lives and mostly shop at the closest store, all the while complaining about their prices.

The supermarkets are just playing by the rules that currently exist. So, let’s change them.

Government should prohibit the acquisition of land by a supermarket within say 3kms of an existing store, unless they are seeking to build a new one. They should also require them to divest by blind tender, their old stores or any land inactively held for a period of time. They also need to restrict their activities on any land to supermarkets’ core business or they will build retirement villages, fast food clusters or whatever is required to keep their competitors out.

Billionaire and some-time New

Zealander, Peter Thiel says ‘competition is for losers’ and all businesses try to avoid it where they can.

Dealing with the property grab is probably the only effective change government can make to the retail landscape.

store owner seeking to sell up might squeeze a bit more out of customers for a year, make a fantastic profit and sell to an up-and-coming new franchisee for top dollar. The new owner will be up to their eyeballs in debt and, sympathy for the devil, they somehow need to extract even more from you to pay it off. So, there is continual pressure to maximise profit.

A capitalist economy is efficient only where there is adequate competition. If the Commerce Commission is to be believed, that isn’t happing in our grocery sector. I’m always slow to cry ‘Regulate!’ but with only two major retailers it would seem necessary.

Be cautious with your expectations though. Smart people in the private sector are usually one step ahead of the regulators or will weave their way through the words and find a loophole. History has also shown that governments of all brands have consistently failed to tame the profits of power companies or banks who have similar dynamics. That shouldn’t stop us trying though.

Even if we get the regulation right, food will never be cheap in New Zealand.

We have relatively high costs of labour, land and energy as well challenging distribution networks, a volatile climate, many small producers and a small population. When cauliflower is $12, it’s likely the grower is losing money and the remnants of a tropical depression have turned their fields into a quagmire. Whereas in some continental countries you can set your watch by rainfall events.

And while we might complain about prices, the quality of our produce, meat, dairy, wine or restaurants is as good as I’ve seen anywhere.

I’m happy to pay the prices, but cheaper is better and I would like the profits to fall more equitably.

54 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Prices here to stay?

There are competitors that could change the competitive landscape.

Arriving next winter is the first Costco in New Zealand. Costco are gargantuan big box stores that sell food, but also tyres for your SUV, coffins and toothpaste, 10 tubes at a time. Their prices are great, but they are not suited to everyday shopping and will likely only ever have a few stores in populous areas.

A more ominous threat are the small format German discounters Aldi and Lidl. The discounter experience is one of small format austerity.

They are not so much supermarkets as selling machines.

They sell most products off a pallet dumped in the store, there is little restocking, limited staff and often long queues at peak hours.

There is a heavy reliance on prepackaged food for checkout efficiency. They also only carry about 1,500 stock keeping units (SKUs) whereas the local New World might have 20,000. Instead of 15 types of olives, you get a choice of black or green. This approach allows them to sell for about one third of the gross margins of mainstream retailers.

You can expect every item in produce to be about $1 cheaper than in a conventional store.

(Don’t get too excited though; rumours are that our small population and unfriendly geography isn’t attractive to them.)

Conversely, there is pressure on Foodstuffs store owners to constantly seek better margins. A

Principal, Dionne Thomas with Karamu High School students. Photo: Florence Charvin

FORMER STUDENT SETS ‘GIVING WHEELS’ IN MOTION Karamu High School’s surprise new Fund set up by a former student is spurring other alumni into ‘giving back’ and it’s hoped its inception will soon pave the way for other schools around Hawke’s Bay to follow suit.

In a first of its kind for Hawke’s Bay Foundation, Executive Officer Amy Bowkett says she was delighted to receive the phone call from the donor, who wishes to remain anonymous. She notes it’s not often people like that ‘come out of the woodwork’.

“We are very grateful to our donor for giving us the opportunity to support Karamu High School in perpetuity. Our long term goal is that every school has their own fund that can be supported by students and alumni. Having an endowment fund ensures the school will receive a guaranteed income annually, that will grow over time.”

The donor has been donating regularly to the school but wanting to make a more permanent gift felt compelled to recently set up their own fund to the tune of $100,000 through Hawke’s Bay Foundation.

In a brief statement, they envisage the newly named Karamu High School Fund will be used for items such as sporting equipment, improving school facilities, learning materials, team activities and scholarships.

“My hope is that this Fund will be supported by other school alumni

or current students, growing in value over the years to become a significant source of extra funds for the school. I certainly appreciated the start Karamu gave me in life.”

The Fund will provide financial support in perpetuity to Karamu High School for the benefit of its 900 plus students in their academic, cultural and sporting activities. As a permanent Fund, it will provide an annual donation to the school for items not funded by government grants.

Karamu Principal Dionne Thomas is thrilled to have such an unexpected asset for their school.

“Having our own endowment fund at Hawke’s Bay Foundation is a remarkable gift from a treasured Tira Ora (alumni of Karamu) that will be there forever to benefit the current students of Karamu High School.”

In an education environment where government funding can fluctuate from year to year, guaranteed incomes from funds set up through Hawke’s Bay Foundation offer a more strategic model of charitable giving.

Adds Amy, “establishing a school fund provides a school with a vehicle for alumni to give back, and contributes to financial stability and predictability in the long term”.

With one of the largest school rolls in Hawke’s Bay and a team of 70 staff, the Karamu High School Fund will have a far-reaching impact and already, since announcing its

inception, Hawke’s Bay Foundation’s Amy Bowkett has seen an uptake in interest from people wanting to donate.

“The day the story broke in the media I fielded a call from a local couple, both with ties to Karamu High School, wanting to find out more about the Fund. I’ve no doubt we’ll start seeing other benevolent locals coming forward, after all, charity begins at home.”

If you, or someone you know would like to contribute to the Karamu High School Fund, head to Hawke’s Bay Foundation’s website: www.hawkesbayfoundation.org.nz/ why-would-i-give/our-funds

HAWKE’S BAY FOUNDATION: A better and more lasting way to give. Hawke’s Bay Foundation provides a simple way for you to support your local community for generations to come. We receive gifts and bequests from individuals, families and businesses – these are pooled and invested forever, with the income used to support local charities.

Words by Alisha Neilson hawkesbayfoundation.co.nz

BayBuzz is pleased to support the Hawke’s Bay Foundation

B RENDA NEW TH

Wattie’s: preserving the legacy

BayBiz

“New Zealand … It’s a brilliant place to innovate because our shoppers are quite progressive in their trends.”

NEIL HEFFER, WATTIE’S NZ MANAGING DIRECTOR

Story Brenda Newth In 1934, during the Great Depression, James Wattie, then manager of Hawke’s Bay Fruit Growers, started a fruit-processing business. It would later become an icon, with a lifelong presence in the pantries, fridges and freezers of almost every New Zealand home, holding a special place in Kiwi culinary culture.

Eighty-seven years later, from those early beginnings on the fertile Heretaunga plains, Wattie’s has grown to include manufacturing plants in Hastings, Canterbury, Dunedin and Auckland and is now part of global food giant Kraft Heinz, a US$26 billion revenue company with nearly 40,000 employees around the world.

In New Zealand, Wattie’s along with Cerebos Greggs and Cerebos Skellerup make up HJ Heinz, a group with $767 million revenue, $41 million profit before tax and around $900 million in total assets for the year ended December 2020.

Neil Heffer, a genial English import and father of four, has held the managing director’s role at Wattie’s New Zealand for three years. He spoke with BayBuzz during Auckland’s Delta Level 4 lockdown.

Force for good

The business was founded on the principles of sustainability and innovation, not wanting to see food wasted, and

providing food for people.

Wattie’s is focused on delivering on the legacy of company founder Sir James Wattie, Heffer says.

“We don’t want to just be a big corporate. We recognise what the Wattie’s brand means to people and we want to celebrate that, not try and diminish it.”

A lot of thought has gone into making the business and its brand positioning more modern and relevant to Kiwi consumers. Wattie’s new “feed the love” brand campaign captures moments between friends and family, celebrating the small, but meaningful things Kiwis do every day to feed the love. Naturally, Wattie’s products are front and centre.

Heffer is acutely conscious of the responsibility that come with a brand like Wattie’s.

“It’s an absolute privilege to be custodians of such a fantastic brand. We see a lot of power in James Wattie’s founding purpose, and are trying to reimagine a modern day version of the business, which is as a force for good.

“We want to have great relationships with our growers, we want to create amazing careers … our products (most of which are made in New Zealand) have great provenance, and there’s a great sustainability story.

“We have a job to do as a company to help consumers understand how good our products are. They are grown in

New Zealand, have low food miles, are sustainably produced to high degree of professionalism, in sustainable packaging, are remarkably good value for money and nutritious.”

Essential services during Covid

As an essential provider, the company operates during Level 4 lockdowns, with protocols that Heffer describes as even more health and safety focused than government guidelines. Factory staff have to wear masks and PPE during long shifts, are temperature tested daily, work within bubbles, and take staggered breaks.

Heffer concedes that the various lockdowns have been hard on people, in both production and office-based roles.

“The thing that is most urgent about running a business in New Zealand at the moment is making sure that you do the right thing and look after people. You have to put profit to one side because the cost of not doing that is extraordinarily high. We are constantly re-evaluating if we are getting it right and making sure that we are doing the right thing.”

Meeting consumer demand has put pressure on factories. The first two weeks of August’s Level 4 lockdown saw demand triple across a number of categories that Heffer describes as “panic buying”. The business managed to meet demand by holding more safety

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 57

stock, planning flexibly and adjusting its supply chain. As for getting product on shelves, Wattie’s has a large team of merchandisers, and the company incentivised those who could, to work at night to replenish shelves, reducing the risk to their households.

There’s no escaping the fact that essential FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) businesses have done well throughout Covid. Food businesses like Wattie’s have benefitted from extra volume, but it’s not something that Heffer takes pleasure in. “It is tough on our people and we’d be happy to do without it.”

Local relationships

Fruit and vegetable growers have been essential to Wattie’s from the very beginning. The company has more than 2,000 grower relationships nationwide and around 300 in Hawke’s Bay. Local growers produce a range of fruit and vegetables for the company, including peaches, pears, plums, boysenberries, beetroot, corn, and tomatoes.

Heffer observes that grower relationships are the one constant in the Wattie’s business. Some relationships, like that with Tukituki Gold Queen peach grower Joseph Burbury are now third generation. Burbury’s orchard produces 6% of Wattie’s Golden Queen peaches each season, as well as other peach varieties, apricots, and cherries and pears.

Being located close to where the fruit is grown is an added bonus, says Heffer. “It’s not a given that food processors will be close by. Wattie’s Hastings plants are no more than 20 minutes from growers and that ensures that crops arrive in peak condition and

58 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Wattie’s King Street canning facility is the Southern Hemisphere’s largest, producing 172 million cans annually.

Stacking the cans end to end would reach all the way to London.

processed at their best.”

In Hastings, crops can be processed within hours of harvest and the two crops with the shortest timelines (of between two and four hours) are tomatoes and corn. Wattie’s King Street canning facility is the Southern Hemisphere’s largest, producing 172 million cans annually. Stacking the cans end to end would reach all the way to London.

With four sites and a distribution centre, Heffer says it is a huge campus of production facilities, each with its own micro economy.

Such massive production and distribution facilities rely on a small army of workers, and at peak season, nearly 1,000 locals are employed.

Labour shortage

Like many other regions, Hawke’s Bay is facing a labour shortage. Closed borders means no backpackers and a significantly reduced number of RSE workers. Growers are under pressure and crops at risk of not being harvested. Wattie’s is potentially affected by the labour shortages, with flow on effects to consumers.

It’s a lose/lose/lose situation.

“Wattie’s miss out, but so do shoppers and the RSE workers who would otherwise be earning and sending money back to their families.

“We’re doing what we can to support the industry, as well as talking to local MPs like Stuart Nash as well as other ministries such as MBIE about the challenges,” he says.

Hastings Mayor Sandra Hazlehurst says Heinz Wattie’s is synonymous with Hastings’ long history as a production powerhouse.

“They have helped put us on the map as one of the best food producing regions in the world.

“We’re really proud of our history with this company whose food is a staple for many New Zealand households and is also a major exporter of canned goods around the globe.

“Wattie’s has remained committed to Hastings since it was founded in 1934 by Sir James Wattie. Sir James was a pioneer in food production and today is a vital employer of hundreds of people in our community,” she says.

Community partnerships

Wattie’s has a number of community partnerships, the most notable being with Plunket. That relationship was formalised in 1990, with the launch of Wattie’s-Plunket baby foods, but has its origins in the late 1950s, when Wattie’s launched a range of baby food.

Other partnerships are with City Mission, Salvation Army, New Zealand Food Network and Nourished for Nil. Heffer notes that “the demand for food through the Covid situation is unfortunately higher than it’s ever been.” So far in 2021, Wattie’s has donated more than 3,600 tonnes of food to good causes.

Here in Hawke’s Bay, Nourished for Nil founder Christina McBeth says that Wattie’s has been a massive support since 2017.

“Wattie’s first donation was 80 pallets of pasta sauce that had been wrongly labelled. Since then they have been very generous, donating cancelled export orders, ageing stock and close to use-by-date product. We don’t question what they give us.”

Nourished for Nil has branches in Hastings, Napier, Flaxmere and Camberley. Pre-lockdown it was helping 450 people daily, rising by a third during lockdown to 600 per day.

McBeth says the relationship with Wattie’s has grown. “As we’ve gotten bigger, we can handle what they give us. We have the infrastructure to

“The thing that is most urgent about running a business in New Zealand at the moment is making sure that you do the right thing and look after people.”

NEIL HEFFER, WATTIE’S NZ MANAGING DIRECTOR

Spanning three generations, the Ladbrooks at Paki Paki Road in Hastings have been Wattie’s peach growers for over 40 years.

manage a lot of product, and I think that means that they’re more likely to give to us again.

“We also have developed relationships with local management who love what we are doing and how we are helping the community,” concludes McBeth.

Innovating to the world

Wattie’s has aspirations of being a “test kitchen” for the Kraft Heinz group, says Heffer.

“The vast majority of Wattie’s innovation and new products reaching shelves in New Zealand supermarkets are developed locally, and there’s potential for these to be shared with the world.

“Because of the number of categories we’re in, we’re in a really great place to innovate well. Kraft Heinz’s major markets are the UK, Canada and the US and New Zealand is a more progressive version (of these markets). It’s a brilliant place to innovate because our shoppers are quite progressive in their trends.

“We have a relatively vertically integrated operation in terms of the relationships with our growers, and we can be quite nimble. We can try things here that we can potentially launch overseas.”

Heffer cites Plant Proteinz, a soup product developed locally and launched last year, that reflects two growing food trends: plant-based and high protein diets. The new range is already in Aussie supermarkets and could go further. Likewise Heinz (Seriously) Good Mayonnaise and Aioli is a global brand that started in New Zealand.

Of (Seriously) Good, Heffer says: “It’s a stunning product that is now a

massive brand in the UK and a really big brand in other markets.”

As to what keeps him awake at night, Heffer says that making sure the business keeps people safe during Covid is a big consideration.

“Every time there is a new lockdown we think that we’ve done it before, but there are nuances to it. It puts businesses under immense pressure to revalidate all of our health and safety and all other protocols, to make sure we are looking after people. We haven’t faced Delta before. We have a really good plan, but that is the thing that is most arresting about my role at the moment.”

One of Kraft Heinz’s global values is doing the right thing, and Heffer says it has never been harder in such an ambiguous situation as Covid.

“We have this outside influence that can completely disrupt what you’ve going to do for the next two months.

Keeping people safe is not as straight forward as it usually is.”

As to the future of the company, Heffer is upbeat.

“We really see New Zealand as a great market for the business. We have a clear role to play. We try to deliver things for people locally, but we are ambitious for New Zealand with our business. That means that the future of the business is really exciting.

Heffer says that Wattie’s international owners care a lot about New Zealand and take it seriously.

“We can get investment, we can also use those global connections to export New Zealand to the world, and that’s how we see the ambition for our New

Zealand business coming to fruition.”

As Wattie’s edges towards to its centenary, it’s time to reflect on a brand that’s been a constant in Kiwi homes for nigh on ninety years. While it remains constant it also constantly changes to ensure that it reflects modern New Zealand. Through food, Wattie’s is showing us who we are. Surely that’s a legacy worth preserving?

Wattie’s Facts Heinz Wattie’s in New Zealand Founded in 1934 • Manufacturing in Hawke’s Bay, Christchurch, Dunedin, Auckland • Key brands: Wattie’s, Heinz, Chef, Craigs, Oak • 2,000 grower relationships nationally, 300 in Hawke’s Bay • Hawke’s Bay cropping includes peaches, pears, plums, boysenberry, beetroot, corn, tomatoes • Nearly 1,000 employees during peak season 4 sites in Hawke’s Bay: • King Street canning operation producing 172 million cans annually.

• Frederick Street producing a wide range of frozen vegetables.

• Tomoana edible producing frozen meals, dressings, jams and pouch soups.

• Tomoana petfood producing Chef, Champ, Bruno, Winna.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 59

BayBiz / MU R R AY PA I N T E R

Big decisions for HB exporters I have written in BayBuzz previously on the shortage of sea containers and the choked-up supply chain we are facing.

Unfortunately, the situation has not improved in the last six months and is not expected to get better by the end of 2022.

With the upcoming season (summer and autumn 2022) not that far away, it is a given that there will be a shortage of refrigerated containers available for exporters of fruit, meat, dairy, and vegetables.

This is exceptionally important to the Bay as the major producer and export region for apples and a large meat, vegetable, and associated products grower.

So, what can be done?

To a degree Hawke’s Bay is at the mercy of the shipping lines and the services and containers they put into the area.

I have had several exporters of apples I have worked with over the years call me as to why they cannot get containers or space bookings on vessels for the last shipments of their 2021 season. They have also asked why Fonterra and meat companies are being allocated supply before apples.

It is not that long ago that we would see pallet-loading refrigerated vessels call Napier on a regular basis.

These vessels, known as ‘reefers’, were full of meat, apples, kiwifruit, dairy, seafood and plied the trade between New Zealand and the USA, Canada, and UK. These reefers worked in opposition to, but alongside container lines. This brought a degree of balance to the trade and kept a lid on freight increases due to competition.

The vessels were chartered in by ship brokers or by exporters large enough to charter their own vessels. The vessels that delivered product to the west coast of the USA brought back South American bananas to New Zealand and some vessels coming back from the UK shut down their refrigeration and

60 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

It is a given that there will be a shortage of refrigerated containers available for exporters of fruit, meat, dairy, and vegetables.

loaded machinery and vehicles for buyers and importers in New Zealand.

What happened to the charters, these refrigerated workhorses?

They still move around the world in good numbers, but due to the consolidation of the meat industry and the muscle of the large container lines they found it uneconomic to come to New Zealand with regular services.

Zespri however continue to fill vessels to Europe and the USA during their season on a regular basis. These vessels are predominantly loading at Tauranga/Mt Maunganui and are exclusively chartered by Zespri.

Reefers for the Bay?

Can Hawke’s Bay exporters charter vessels for the 2022 season to relieve the pressure brought about by the lack of containers and unreliable services?

Yes of course they can, however there are profoundly serious considerations that must be undertaken before a charter party (contract for chartering) can be signed.

Chartering is the ultimate take or pay contract. You book the vessel; it sails halfway around the world to get here; then if you do not fill it up you pay for it anyway.

Exporters are starting to see this from container lines during the current environment. If you book a container and then do not uplift it or deliver it to the vessel, lines are charging penalties for non-performance. They can do anything they like when containers and shipping space is at a premium!

There are also logistics and arrangements needed for a charter vessel at the load and discharge ports. Not every port

overseas or in New Zealand can manage charter vessels and there are several support parties that need to be contracted to ensure the load and discharge goes smoothly. If the vessel is too long in port, then owners of the vessel may charge a fee per day for the delay. This can be in the thousands of dollars!

Apple exporter shipping history

Hawke’s Bay apple exporters have a poor record in meeting obligations when it comes to shipping space.

They had the opportunity for their own seasonal service following deregulation, but were not prepared to take the risk of ‘take or pay’ by committing to a contracted number of tonnes or pallets for each vessel chartered in.

Consequently, the only alternative was to ship in containers, and this resulted in a “one horse race” and we end up with today’s scenario.

Exporters of apples would need to appoint a chartering ‘independent’ to run their charters as a history of using one of their own tended to raise questions as to who was looking after whom. They will, of course need to remunerate an independent manager.

I participated in an independent apple shippers’ group which pooled shipping space on container vessels.

The shipping rate was the same for all parties irrespective of size, but if an exporter met contracted volumes there was an incentive paid per container.

Rates were averaged out to flatten out the high rates charged by some lines by using lines with cheaper rates.

Multiple exporters signed up to this, but failed to meet the volumes promised, sometimes falling short by fifty percent or more. Of course, they argued they should still receive their incentives!

With the mistakes from the past now known and the unregulated industry (apple) now matured to some degree, a chance to do this once again is here.

In my opinion, a regular service of reefers alongside the container

offerings would be the best way to go, ensuring that the balance was there, but also using the reefers to move the peak tonnages mid-season.

Other perishable exporters

Why Fonterra and meat companies receive preference over apple exporters (and onion exporters too) is a matter of commercial power. Dairy and meat are 12 months of the year exporters, and their volumes are massive. The apple industry is seasonal and traditionally pays lower rates of freight.

Zespri have a quite different

shipping season to apples and previous attempts to combine the industries in shipping negotiations have not proceeded. Contracting to have apples as a partner on charter vessels has no commercial advantage to Zespri who ship in months where little other produce moves and consequently kiwifruit enjoys competitive rates.

Napier Port and Government help

Napier Port is flexible enough to cater for chartered reefers and has done so in the past fairly well. The port has cool stores albeit with a road separating the

store and the wharves.

Government assistance is another area that has not, as far as I know, been fleshed out in the current environment (as if they have not got enough on their hands!).

They have, however, set a precedent in working with Air New Zealand and the forwarding community to get seasonal charter flights to move perishable exports during the last summer.

It would make sense for the Government to invest in reefer time-charters (vessels chartered for an agreed period) on behalf of perishable exporters and have this run by an independent chartering manager. This could be the catalyst in diffusing the pressure points coming next summer.

If we don’t move in this or a similar direction, we could see full Hawke’s Bay coolstores early in the season and, as a worst case scenario, product rotting on trees, not from no RSE’s but because there is nowhere for it to go!

Food for thought.

A licensed customs broker by trade, Murray Painter has years of experience in international trade with a focus on perishable products. He is a former chairman of Export Hawkes’ Bay.

Total Food Equipment Bower Street Napier www.tfe.co.nz

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 61

BayBiz / NI CK ST E WA RT

The myth of money vs morality The long-held belief that you cannot align your personal values with your financial portfolio in order to succeed is no longer true.

In a time where we are seeing increasingly serious impact from human influence on the environment, investing ethically and sustainably is fast becoming an extremely appealing option... and where there’s demand for ethical investing, there will be supply.

Aligning your ethical values with your investment strategy can seem daunting. First there’s the ambiguity of what ethical investing should be called. This ambiguity creates questions for investors – what is actually on offer? What is their purpose and performance? How do we make sure the strategy a fund or manager is using aligns with our values?

What’s in a name?

In a nutshell, ESG investing strategies include consideration of Environmental, Social and Governance factors.

From there it can get a little murky.

Fund sponsors may use terms like ESG and SRI (socially responsible investing) interchangeably, or call the whole field ‘impact investing’. Others use terms such as values-based investing, mission-driven investing, ethical investing, or even just responsible investing.

And of course there are considerations regarding whether the companies themselves genuinely uphold these values, or if they’re greenwashing (over-representing their sustainability commitments) to make themselves more appealing to sustainable-minded investors.

New Zealand doesn’t have a government-mandated ESG reporting framework. We have a series of voluntary and mandated corporate reporting measures, which only a small proportion of companies use to report. These tend to be larger firms, like those on the NZX Top 100. So, in companies that even report sustainability-related

62 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Companies with high sustainability scores tend to have stronger controls and better compliance, which leads to fewer extreme events like environmental distasters, fraud, corruption or litigation (and the consequent fallout from these events).

information, the standard and type of information can vary greatly.

The real merit in these third-party assessments isn’t in the reliable ranking of companies across the board, but rather in the transparency they encourage. So while a company identifying as ESG isn’t going to be inherently ‘green’, it will be harder for a non-ESG to prove themselves so.

We could see some movement on this reporting soon. The United Nations Climate Conference in Glasgow will produce the long-awaited update to the 2015 Paris Agreement, asking countries to come forward with more ambitious and verifiable emissions plans to reach net zero by mid century.

If a new Agreement is finalised and implemented it will set higher standards for both government and industry to meet.

Back here at home we have the Financial Sector (Climate-related Disclosures and Other Matters) Amendment Bill in its second reading – this bill aims to broaden the reporting requirements of financial entities. While this only seeks to identify large players in the financial sector as climate reporting entities, it may if passed set a precedent for climaterelated disclosure by other businesses.

Red flags for greenwashing

There can be a world of difference between companies identifying themselves as ESG and those actually making and keeping sustainability commitments.

When investing, you may see funds labelling themselves as “sustainable” or “ethical” or “impact”. One way you can identify for yourself whether these align with your values is to look at the philosophy of the fund. Does it have a track record of addressing global sustainability, and can they demonstrate this? If not, why?

As long as self-reporting is the status quo, investors must be careful and do some homework. If a company is saying they are ESG they should have visible evidence to back their claim. Keep in mind the distinction between virtue signalling and actual social impact. For example, a phone case made from recyclable materials may seem like an environmentally friendly choice… but if it’s been made in a sweatshop, it’s not a sustainable product.

Investor preference

The most appealing part of investing sustainably, personal preference aside, is that you can view this kind of investment as risk management. Companies with high sustainability scores tend to have stronger controls and better compliance, which leads to fewer extreme events like environmental distasters, fraud, corruption or litigation (and the consequent fallout from these events).

Translation: Companies who voluntarily put themselves under the microscope are more likely to behave well, which means less potential for disaster and scandal.

By favouring companies with a high sustainability rating, you will inherently be diverting investment from those with low sustainability ratings – making it more desirable for companies to ‘go green’. In this way, investor behaviour can have a real impact on business behaviour.

By favouring companies with a high sustainability rating, you will inherently be diverting investment from those with low sustainability ratings – making it more desirable for companies to ‘go green’. In this way, investor behaviour can have a real impact on business behaviour.

Where do I start?

You need to determine what your values are before you look for investments to match. If you know what you want (or what you absolutely do not want), you can form a strategy around it.

That said, be wary of putting all your eggs in one basket. Having a diverse portfolio is important for long-term success, and the list of sustainable options doesn’t stop at choosing wind farms over coal mines.

As an investor, you have the option to pursue a sound investment experience that’s reflective of your sustainability values. There is no longer an either/or situation. Much like at the supermarket, where you no longer need to choose between a weak

paper bag or single-use plastic when resuable ones are available, there is a third option which can effectively accomplish what you need to achieve financially, while demonstrating your commitment to sustainability.

Ultimately, the purpose of socially responsible investing is to create a virtuous cycle by allocating capital to those companies that create the greatest societal returns — not just in ‘normal’ business terms but in improving the welfare of customers, employees, suppliers, and communities as well.

This can be achieved with a financial adviser who can design an approach to preserve performance while accounting for positive social and environmental impact.

The information provided, or any opinions expressed in this article, are of a general nature only and should not be construed or relied on as a recommendation to invest in a financial product or class of financial products. You should seek financial advice specific to your circumstances from a Financial Adviser before making any financial decisions. A disclosure statement can be obtained free of charge by calling 0800 878 961 or visit our website, www.stewartgroup.co.nz Nick Stewart is a financial adviser and CEO at Stewart Group, a Hawke’s Baybased CEFEX certified financial planning and advisory firm. Stewart Group provides personal fiduciary services, wealth management, risk insurance and KiwiSaver solutions.

Thinking of the future?

So are we.

Call us for a free, no obligation chat with an expert financial adviser to discuss your situation and goals.

0800 878 961 WWW.STEWARTGROUP.CO.NZ T&Cs apply. Disclosure statements available on request and free of charge.

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 63

IDEAS + OPINION GLENN FULCHER

Hospitality industry needs to be more inventive The pessimistic view of the hospitality industry these days is that the outlook is bleak. But in reality, we have an opportunity to reinvigorate this vital part of our local economy.

The Covid-19 pandemic has made things tougher, and it is always upsetting to see restaurants and pubs closing down. However, the nature of hospitality is that you will always see establishments shutting their doors.

Maybe Covid-19 has just hastened the process in some cases.

Covid-19 has certainly forced the good operators to get better at what they do and to get smarter in how they position their business.

They have had to diversify and work through all the new regulations to ensure that they can still operate in some

64 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

If fine dining establishments like Craggy Range and Mission Estate can start takeaway services during lockdowns, then anything is possible. way at each different Alert Level.

If fine dining establishments like Craggy Range and Mission Estate can start takeaway services during lockdowns, then anything is possible.

One of the biggest problems some of them have faced has been not being able to hire staff at will. We used to have a steady stream of international travellers who would work their hearts out for a few months and then move on,

to be replaced by other backpackers.

As a result, the hospitality industry has relied on a transient workforce that has dried up as a result of the pandemic. The on-tap stream of foreigners made us all complacent and the closure of our borders has compelled owners to be smarter in the retention of staff.

I am hearing more stories of owners starting to give percentages of their business to key staff as a way of holding on to them, because it creates ‘buy-in’ to how successful businesses operate. This is very important because the talent pool is very small, and we can’t seem to recruit enough.

Statistics show that there are currently fewer secondary school leavers

than normal. This is something that normally happens in a five to six-year cycle, but New Zealand’s current low unemployment rates is simply adding to this problem.

We are also seeing a larger percentage of school leavers learn a trade because that’s where the money is perceived to be these days. Builders are doing well in the current environment and good on them, but it does not help our industry. We need to make this a fun and exciting career for youngsters to pursue straight from school.

Losing the international workforce has had a huge impact and now we simply have to look at ways to attract new talent and, in particular young learners, into our restaurants and kitchens.

By my calculation, there are five job opportunities for every one of the current learners in our School of Hospitality and Tourism at EIT; jobs that would suit them. The demand for good staff is great and we need to meet those needs.

We have always had a diverse mix of learners at the School of Tourism and Hospitality. However, there has been a change over the years. While we still have the school leavers, we are now also attracting those who have

worked for a few years and even more mature learners who have changed career to follow their passion. The growth in learners needs to come from those school leavers.

The increase in mature learners has, in turn, resulted in a change to the types of programmes we offer.

For many years we had traditional qualifications because that was where the demand was. While those qualifications are important, more recently we have also had to design a diverse range of programmes that fit in with learners’ lives.

An example of this is our new part-time cookery programme, which is aimed at people with at least two years’ industry experience. They come to us one day each week for two years and then emerge with a New Zealand Certificate in Cookery (Level 4).

We believe there will be huge growth in this area. Owners realise they need to invest in their younger staff and a two-year part-time programme is a great way to lock them in, help them grow with the business and earn money while they are learning.

Part of our adaptability at EIT has been growing online learning like our new food costing micro-credential.

We have also simplified enrolment for our short courses like barista and food safety. All you need to do is buy a ticket online and you are enrolled.

Not only are we adding to the ways we offer short courses and programmes, but we have also diversified the content. For example, we now offer a plant-based cookery programme.

It is all part of our role to serve the Hawke’s Bay hospitality sector and provide a stable and skilled workforce.

There are many opinions out there on the best way to revitalise our industry and although there is no magic bullet, I do believe adaptability and diversification is the key. The industry needs to continue to rethink how it employs and incentivises staff. In a tight employment market this has to be one of the keys to retaining staff. EIT is also committed to adapting and diversifying to support the training needs of the sector and grow the workforce.

We just need to grow our workforce and the way to do that is to encourage youth to see hospitality as a career not just a job.

Glenn Fulcher is the Head of EIT’s School of Tourism and Hospitality and the English Language Centre.

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 65

IDEAS + OPINION DOMINIC SALMON

Let’s demolish construction waste The housing crisis and construction boom are common headlines these days, but what seldom makes the news is the waste created by the sector.

For the average person, when we think about waste going to landfill we see the stuff in our rubbish bins at home or at work, but a major portion of what goes to landfill in New Zealand is actually from the construction and demolition sector.

This isn’t to say we can ease up on efforts to reduce household waste.

Construction and demolition (C&D) waste, which goes to class 2 landfills, is inert while household waste, which goes to municipal landfills (class 1), can create greenhouse gases and leachate, and contains a cocktail of chemicals and materials that can be environmentally harmful.

Large volume and lost resources C&D waste makes up around half of all waste going to landfill in New Zealand, and while its environmental impact in landfill is negligible it represents a substantial loss of resources and energy. Timber, concrete, gib board and metal are some of the most common components of clean fill waste – much of which could potentially have second lives.

Concrete, for example, can be (and in some cases is) crushed and used as an aggregate in the production of new concrete. Window glass, which can’t be recycled with bottles or jars due to its composition, can also be crushed as aggregate. Timber can have further uses if properly recovered.

Cost and behaviour There are two key factors which drive the lack of recycling or repurposing of C&D waste.

Separating timber, glass, metal and a myriad of other materials from demolition waste is labour-intensive,

66 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Timber, concrete, gib board and metal are some of the most common components of clean fill waste – much of which could potentially have second lives. requires additional space, and isn’t always considered viable. But above all, it is simply not yet normalised behaviour on a building site.

The second key factor, which drives the decision to landfill this waste rather than recover it, comes down to cost. The labour-intensiveness of sorting and diverting waste, means it’s not always seen as a viable option.

New Zealand’s landfill levy (at $10 a tonne since 2009) is one of the lowest in the OECD. In addition, the levy, set by the government and applied over and above landfill charges, only applies to class 1 landfills. This means all other landfills, including those which take C&D waste, have been exempt from this additional charge. This is set to change though, with new regulations which will both expand and increase the levy.

Following a substantial review, the levy will be applied to all four classes of landfill, with C&D landfills (class 2) beginning on 1 July 2022.

The new regulations also mean the levy will increase between 1 July 2021 and 1 July 2024. For class 1 landfills this will mean an increase from $10 per tonne to $60 and for class 2 landfills it will reach $30 per tonne.

Change is happening The increased and expanded levy is one mechanism for change. However, there is also a growing desire in the sector, as in others, to reduce waste and use resources more efficiently as

part of the social licence to operate.

In his presentation at the recent Building Out Waste 2021 conference, Adam Durant of market research agency Colmar Brunton pointed out while there is a willingness to do better, there are very real time and financial constraints to consider.

“There is no silver bullet,” he says, and change will need to be incremental with support from external markets and backing through regulation.

This isn’t to say there is no waste reduction and diversion already happening. A number of companies, including some in Hawke’s Bay, are keeping up the age-old business of recovering valuable materials, ranging from timber to fittings and windows, for resale. Items such as taps, door handles and architraves in particular period styles can be valuable.

There are then knock-on benefits such as preserving the heritage of older buildings and creating further employment and income through the sale of the recovered materials.

Target setting Currently there is a growing body of work, such as trials and case studies, being done by both the commercial sector and government organisations to reduce building and construction waste.

Some examples include Kāinga Ora having adopted the waste hierarchy within its redevelopment site clearances. It has set a target of diverting 80% of site clearance material, by weight, from landfill on all its Auckland redevelopment projects.

Auckland’s City Rail Link project – currently the country’s largest construction project – achieved a 95% diversion rate for construction and demolition waste from its ‘contract two’ work and a 97% diversion from its ‘contract three’ work.

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Countdown recently opened its most sustainable store – accredited by Green Star – which reduced construction waste to landfill by 83%. This was achieved by recycling demolition waste where possible, using fly ash in the foundations and recycled aggregate in the asphalt.

around standard material sizes, such as the size of gib board, greatly reduces offcuts and waste.

Thought also needs to be given to ensure a building is easily maintained and, at the end of life, can be deconstructed and its materials reused, repurposed or recycled.

Clients and designers While the companies and contractors doing the building and demolition work are one side of the coin, their clients and the building designers are the other.

The average new build home produces some 4.5 tonnes of waste, yet when building a home the waste which is produced isn’t always top of mind for the client. This isn’t necessarily due to a lack of care, but rather the fact that building a home is a large undertaking.

As anyone in this position knows, the stress of the decisions, cost, and delays take up most of their bandwidth.

However, creating awareness around the waste and presenting options to mitigate it at the start of the project can make a big difference.

Designers and architects also have a vital role to play in planning out buildings which result in minimal waste.

For example, a building designed

Where to from here?

There is no doubt the C&S sector has a long road ahead if it is to reduce the literal mountain of waste it sends to landfill each year. The continued boom in the sector also increases the urgency of the problem.

However, between the increase and expansion of the landfill levy and the growing desire by builders, government organisations, designers and clients to see better outcomes, I am confident we will see positive change.

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 67

IDEAS + OPINION CHARLES DAUGHERTY

Des Ratima – thinking globally, acting locally Four years ago, I attended a meeting at the Hawke’s Bay Airport with Des Ratima. We arrived separately but departed at the same time, walking together through the lobby and into the parking lot. The journey was revealing.

About 80 metres and 20 minutes later, we reached the car. Every person in the airport seemed to know Des and wanted – needed, even – to talk with him. As he ran the gauntlet of friends and admirers, people smiled, queried his health, shared a thought, wished him well. Des returned each smile, stopping often, sometimes saying little but giving a knowing nod. He worked the crowd quietly, enjoying each moment, holding a moveable court.

I’d only known Des for a few months at the time, but it was clear that Des had a unique magic. People loved and respected him, and in turn he enjoyed the connections and reciprocated the emotions.

The remembrances published since Des’ death in late August 2021 have catalogued a life of wide-ranging service: a career in the NZ Army that included developing their first marae; leading a kōhanga reo; supporting inmates in the Hawke’s Bay Regional Prison; and serving as a member of the Rangatahi Court, to list a few. He had run for both local and parliamentary office several times, but was proudest of his unofficial title, ‘Mayor of Whakatu’. Deeply connected to his local community, Des wanted a better future for it.

Part of Des’ genius lay in how he understood local issues. Des saw the connections between immediate problems and the larger world beyond – and acted on them to advance larger issues. He exemplified the common dictum “Think globally, act locally.”

His actions were guided by deeply held Māori values and a belief that

68 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Part of Des’ genius lay in how he understood local issues. Des saw the connections between immediate problems and the larger world beyond – and acted on them to advance larger issues.

Māori culture could create a pathway to a better future for our country.

In leading development of the Army’s first marae, for example, Des laid the groundwork for an Army empowered by a distinctive New Zealand culture. When the Army undertook a peacekeeping role in Bougainville, Des proposed that Māori values – no weapons, leadership roles for women – could create a peace that other armed militaries had failed to achieve.

Documented elegantly in the film Soldiers Without Guns, the long civil war in Bougainville was brought to a conclusion.

Des’ deep commitment to the natural environment has been little mentioned in remembrances. We met in 2016 and worked together with a small group of likeminded people to develop Biodiversity Hawke’s Bay, a not-for-profit organisation established in 2018 to advance the goals of the Hawke’s Bay Biodiversity Strategy.

In the last several years of Des’ life, we met often – nominally to discuss biodiversity restoration, but the conversations usually turned to other matters, including his remarkable life. Des would speak quietly, often with a cheeky smile. His good humour could sometimes conceal his deep commitment to nature, but it also brought people together and moved our work forward.

Des was not a newcomer to environmental restoration. In 2007 he led a

project to re-plant the Karamū Stream that ran through Whakatu. A decade later, he was still remembered well by the then Minister of Conservation, Eugenie Sage, who had attended the 2007 celebration of the project as a Forest & Bird officer.

In Des’ lifetime, the Karamū’s channel had been altered. Its banks had become overgrown with willow, the water muddied, the biodiversity much diminished. The loss of clean water and the potential for kai from the river represented not only an insult to nature but also an environmental injustice inflicted on the Māori people of this region. Repairing nature was thus a way of restoring the mauri – life force – of the river and the mana of the people.

As always, Des had a larger vision – to re-establish the historical connections of the Karamū and Ngaruroro Rivers as part of ecological restoration of both catchments to their headwaters. He used the name Ngaruroro River to symbolise his unified vision of restoration of both rivers, bringing justice to both nature and people.

Des’ work on behalf of underdogs continued until his death. One morning in late May 2019, we met for morning tea. Before we sat, he quietly said he’d been up all night at the hospital.

I expressed concern about his health, but he shrugged and told me that Evelyn, his beloved wife and partner in many endeavours, and he had gone to the hospital to support a young woman confronted with Oranga Tamariki officers who intended to take her newborn baby.

As he told the outlines of the story, I struggled to comprehend how two individuals supporting some hospital staff and a young mother could fend off the authority of the state. Two nights later, I saw Des on national television news, flanked by multiple government

Photo: Florence Charvin

ministers, as the story went public.

Des believed that the better course for that mother and child was within their whānau and a supportive local community. Clearly, Government was listening.

The actions of Des and Evelyn crash-started changes to Oranga Tamariki – the chief executive has gone, and its culture has undergone intense scrutiny. Acting on one local injustice, Des and Evelyn have changed a ministry.

Des maintained a grueling schedule, traveling often to Wellington,

Auckland or elsewhere. I asked him several times how he could maintain the intensity, and did he really have time for his biodiversity work? His answer was simple: “I work for biodiversity restoration because it makes me feel good.”

He would tell me that he planned to spend the afternoon in his garden.

“What will you plant?” I asked. “Nothing,” he replied with a smile – “I just sit there.”

Des made a difference here in the Bay, for New Zealand, and well

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beyond. We will miss Des, his vision, the courage of his actions, and his friendship.

Charles Daugherty is Emeritus Professor of Ecology, Victoria University. Awarded an ONZM for his work on tuatara ecology and management. A former trustee of Zealandia, he’s involved with Biodiversity Hawke’s Bay since retiring to Hawke’s Bay, serving as chair of the trust board, but writing in his personal capacity.

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Jose Aparicio. Photo: Florence Charvin

SA RA H CA M ERON

Culture

Bravo!

For the love of music

The story of Hawke’s Bay’s classical musical life is filled with a large cast of players, passionate supporters and fine musicians, many of whom have devoted their lives to bringing classical music to our communities.

We are a region blessed with musical opportunities thanks to the dedication of many people over the years – too many to name in one story – who have paved the way for what we enjoy as a thriving classical music scene.

For a provincial region with a modest population, we’re punching above our classical musical weight.

We have a smorgasbord of musical offerings on our doorstep: country music clubs, rock bands, jazz groups, orchestras, a soul choir, and everything in between. We also have a deep pool of talent; people who have always called Napier and Hastings home and those who have chosen Hawke’s Bay as a place to live and who are willing to share their talents with us.

The thing about provincial towns and cities is that their cultural life often lies underground, out of sight and undiscovered. Uncovering Hawke’s Bay’s classical musical life is to find a region full of rich experiences and opportunities for young and old, the talented and the enthusiastic.

How as a region we came to have such a bountiful classical musical offering is complex and made up of many moving parts.

One of the key ‘players’ is José Aparicio, a leading light in Hawke’s Bay’s musical life, and energetic

proponent of the benefits music brings to us as people and as communities. He is music director of Napier City Choir, principal conductor of the Hawke’s Bay Orchestra, artistic director of Project Prima Volta (PPV), and a private singing and flute coach.

José says the region is enjoying a “golden era” of cultural offerings.

“Hawke’s Bay sits in a place that is appealing to Aucklanders and Wellingtonians and has a fabulous level of culture on offer for the population that it has. Art and culture have always been in Hawke’s Bay’s soul, with strong traditions in theatre and music and people who have dedicated their lives to furthering those traditions.”

When José first arrived here from Alicante in 2009, he and wife Anna (opera singer Anna Pierard) “immersed themselves” in the community, seeing opportunities to develop the existing musical offerings.

“There is no doubt musical and artistic life existed here at that time, but we were keen to create different programmes and new ways of delivering them,” says José. “To do that we needed the full support of the community, which we’ve had from day one.

We were so lucky to meet people like Ruth Thomas and Raewyn Newcomb, who played major roles in the musical

“Hawke’s Bay sits in a place that is appealing to Aucklanders and Wellingtonians and has a fabulous level of culture on offer for the population that it has.”

JOSÉ APARICIO

community at the time.”

José says that any artistic group is of vital importance to the health and wellbeing of communities and societies.

“Not only do these groups bring focus, joy, expression and a sense of achievement to all of their members, it also reminds our society of the great beauty of arts in a deeper way, at times when artifice is the common denominator in entertainment.”

Many strings to our bows

Hawke’s Bay’s orchestral life is rich and varied, catering for people of all ages and abilities.

Peter Williams is a musician who has been instrumental in shaping Hawke’s Bay’s classical music scene.

Peter arrived in Hawke’s Bay in 1966 to take up a teaching position at Napier

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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 71

“Picking up a cello after a 30 year hiatus was done with equal parts trepidation and excitement. I needn’t have worried. The Community Orchestra was full of people like me and the perfect place to ‘get back on the horse’. We laughed as much as we played and it was a fabulous grounding for what was to come. ”

Hawke’s Bay Orchestra. Photo: Rachel Burt.

Boys’ High School and was music tutor at the Community College (now EIT) from 1975 to 1989. He formed and conducted the Evening Orchestra – part of the extensive night class programme at NBHS – which became the Hawke’s Bay Regional Orchestra.

Peter was also the president of the Institute of Registered Music Teachers, the Trinity College London local representative for 27 years, and conductor of the Trinity Methodist Choir and the Napier Civic Choir. Many will know him from reading his concert reviews and previews in local newspapers, which he wrote for 50 years. Violinist and teacher Norma Smith played in the Evening Orchestra when she was in her 20s and says Peter was a “driving force” in the region’s classical music scene.

“We put on some great performances with concert pianists, including Maurice Till and Diedre Irons in the 1980s, with the orchestra made up of local players.

Today I still play alongside musicians who were in the Evening Orchestra – it’s been a long association.”

The Regional Orchestra stopped making music when Peter Williams retired in 1989 but emerged again a few years later in a new form as the Hawke’s Bay Orchestra (HBO).

HBO is a unique group compared to other regional orchestras. A core of local players is supplemented come concert time by professional musicians from around the country. This allows HBO to become a full-strength symphony orchestra and play repertoire of significant standard. The orchestra also regularly accompanies the Napier Civic Choir and works closely with Festival Opera.

José, HBO’s principal conductor, has worked with many professional orchestras in his career and says Hawke’s Bay is very lucky to have professional musicians living here.

“It is exceptionally good for a group like HBO, because the amateur players in the orchestra get to play alongside phenomenal quality players every week, which enhances their playing and also raises their expectations. The concerts have a standard of playing uncommon for a group the size of HBO and definitely a level above most regional orchestras.”

The Hawke’s Bay Orchestral Society, the longest running organisation of its kind in the country, has a mandate to “provide opportunities for musical education and cultural experiences” and does just that through its stable of three orchestras.

For young people there is the Training Orchestra designed to develop the skills needed to progress on to the Youth Orchestra. It’s an audition-free group taken by Mary McHattie, and the only thing needed is an ability between grades 2 and 5, and a bellyful

of enthusiasm.

The Youth Orchestra is made up of more advanced young players, introducing them to the challenges of symphonic repertoire and presenting both formal and informal performances.

Conducted by Sue Melville for more than 25 years, the baton is now held by Kimbali Harding.

For adults who are either coming back to music after an extended break or have started learning an instrument later in life, the Community Orchestra taken by Charlotte van Asch is the perfect place to start.

The Community Orchestra is where my orchestral journey restarted. The last group I played in before moving to Hawke’s Bay was the New Zealand Secondary Schools orchestra way back when. Picking up a cello after a 30 year hiatus was done with equal parts trepidation and excitement. I needn’t have worried. The Community Orchestra was full of people like me and the perfect place to ‘get back on the horse’. We laughed as much as we played and it was a fabulous grounding for what was to come.

A few short years later, I am now a cellist in the Hawke’s Bay Orchestra, playing alongside some incredibly talented musicians and experiencing the thrill of playing huge symphonic works and interesting repertoire.

Smaller scale string groups are also an important part in Hawke’s Bay’s classical life, two of which are Concord Strings and Cathedral Strings.

Vincent James established Concord Strings over 40 years ago, a string orchestra performing more intimate chamber music works. Concord

Te Awanga | Hawke’s Bay | Aotearoa

accompanied many guest soloists over the years and regularly performed with the Linden Singers and Hastings Choral Society. When Vincent retired in 2019, the group morphed into Cathedral Strings under the baton of Anthony Tattersall, accompanying the Napier Cathedral Choir and also presenting their own concerts.

“It seems that there is a lot of opportunity for players at all different levels,” says Norma Smith. “There’s a lot of talent and it’s wonderful to see people return to the Bay sharing their talents. Playing in these groups is such a lovely pleasurable thing to do.”

The Hastings Music Society’s origins date back to the 1930s when it was known as the British Music Society.

Today, it holds monthly concerts at St Matthew’s Church in Hastings. Vocal and instrumental musicians of all ages are given the opportunity to perform in front of a loyal audience, and rewarded with a cup of tea and a scone at the end. The Society also organises the monthly “Around the Piano” free concerts in Havelock North.

“There’s always been a huge amount of music happening in the Bay, I think we absolutely punch above our weight and there have always been many opportunities for musicians here.”

PETER WILLIAMS

Schools contribute

Mention must be made of the exceptional work done in schools to encourage the next generation of classical musicians.

Long-time Hawke’s Bay music educator Ngaire Shand delivers free violin and cello lessons from a team of dedicated tutors through her Orokohanga Music Trust for students in the community who would not otherwise have the opportunity to learn an instrument. Another, Or-ches-trate, is a young emerging artist programme that

provides educational and performance opportunities for Hawke’s Bay school students. Or-ches-trate is coordinated

by Raewyn Newcomb and principal guest tutor and conductor Gregory Squire of the NZ Symphony Orchestra.

The Hawke’s Bay Youth Orchestra has also benefited from professional input through the NZSO’s outreach programme.

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Hawke’s Bay Orchestra. Photo: Rachel Burt.

Many schools have strong orchestras, as evidenced by the annual ‘Play In Day’, where students from more than 20 intermediate schools gather for a day of learning new pieces culminating in an afternoon performance.

“There’s always been a huge amount of music happening in the Bay,” adds Peter Williams. “I think we absolutely punch above our weight and there have always been many opportunities for musicians here. There was always a youth orchestra in both Hastings and Napier and numerous choirs.”

Sing your heart out

If there is something Hawke’s Bay isn’t short of, it’s choirs. There’s the Napier Civic Choir, the Linden Singers, Hastings Choral Society, community choirs, Project Prima Volta (PPV) and while not classical, a newly formed soul choir.

Each year 30 teenagers from diverse backgrounds are accepted for PPV, a year-long programme of coaching and mentoring culminating in a performance in a fully staged classical opera.

PPV students also present their very own opera as part of the Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival each year. While the focus is on singing and stage performance, the teens also develop leadership skills, resilience and self-confidence.

74 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

In 2013, Anna Pierard and Sarah Walmsley launched Festival Opera to utilise talent in the region to bring world class opera to Hawke’s Bay stages.

“We believe that communities that have music in them are healthier of mind and soul, so we work hard to build the audiences of the future through our outreach programme, delivered in partnership with PPV. Our huge team of volunteers is proof of the connection between giving your time for a community project and positively impacting wellbeing,” says Anna.

For the non-auditioning inclined, there are several go-to choirs.

Napier Civic Choir was formed in 1968. Each year, the NCC and HBO present choral and orchestral musical weekends featuring the choir with local, national and international vocal soloists and leading professional instrumental soloists.

The Hawke’s Bay Community Choir is a social singing group based in Clive.

The choir has been singing its heart out for 10 years, now under the tutelage of tenor Tevivi Daniel. No experience is necessary and unlike the other choirs, neither is the ability to read music. The choir hosts small concerts, sings annually at Christmas at a rest home and every two years, takes part in a sing-fest

with other choirs in the region.

Hastings Choral Society is also a community choir performing works by a range of composers including opera chorus, folk music, great sacred works, contemporary New Zealand composers and traditional choral repertoire under the guidance of music director Joe Christensen.

Singing teacher and performer Dianne Abraham has lived in Hawke’s Bay since 1989. The soprano has performed with Opera Hawke’s Bay, Napier Operatic and various other musical societies both locally and nationally. Dianne also is a regular soloist for local concerts, but says the opportunities for singers to sustain a career here are limited.

“Classical music is alive and well in Hawke’s Bay, however the professional opportunities lie in the big cities or overseas. There’s not enough classical work to perform consistently here – you must have other strings to your bow. We do have a very high standard of singers and in the past Opera Hawke’s Bay has benefited from some exceptional visiting directors including Raymond Hawthorne, Richard Campion and Sara Brody. They expected, and Hawke’s Bay was rewarded with, operas of an

international standard,” she says.

Dianne is also a trustee and board member of Singing School New Zealand, which has been operating for more than 30 years. Established by Beatrice Webster and facilitated by members of the Song and Opera Workshop, the aim of the school is to grow voices of the future – singers not only in Hawke’s Bay but throughout Australasia across multiple genres including musical theatre, classical and crossover – the only singing school in the Southern Hemisphere to cater for all three. The school boasts a faculty of top national and international tutors and gives students an opportunity for one-on-one tutoring to develop confidence, professional links and career paths. The next school is scheduled for January 2023.

And the band played on

There is a small but thriving brass and pipe band culture in Hawke’s Bay. It has a long history, starting in 1868 with the establishment of the Port of Napier Brass Band. In 2014, the Port Band amalgamated with the Hastings Citizen Band to become known as Deco Bay Brass. Like its orchestral counterparts, Deco Bay Brass has invested in the next generation to ensure its future, with an academy band set up, led by the band’s trombone player, Carmel Spencer.

Havelock North High School head of music Robbie Cargill was Deco Bay Brass’ musical director for seven years and is a passionate conductor and horn player.

“Before Deco Brass, I played in the Napier Port Band, and also tutored the NZ National Youth Brass Band. Playing an instrument relies on regular commitment to make progress, but the

rewards are worth it. I started playing when I was six and was attracted to the huge sound, size and variety of music a brass ensemble plays – from classical to pop and jazz.

“There are other opportunities for brass players in the Bay too – the Bay Cities Symphonic Band, the Napier Technical Band, plus orchestral brass players can play with the Hawke’s Bay Orchestra or in musical theatre productions as part of a pit orchestra.”

Raising the bar

With more and more people relocating to Hawke’s Bay for its lifestyle, including its cultural offering, the region’s musical bar is being raised. José says the key to any province increasing the standard and breadth of its musical life is developing people’s potential.

“One of the factors essential for growth is the expectation of excellence. You may get there or not, but expecting to achieve or to over-achieve is critical. I was very lucky to have a father who was a conductor and worked with community groups all his life. He pushed every one of them and they delivered to levels you wouldn’t think they’d be capable of. It’s contagious too – when a group is pushed to do their best it encourages everyone else to reach their potential or take on a project above the level of what they think they can achieve.

“I love taking part in those projects and working with those groups. It’s wonderful to see people extending themselves. There’s a sense of magic and it’s magnificent.”

While the opportunities to be involved in classical music here are

“We do have a very high standard of singers and in the past Opera Hawke’s Bay has benefited from some exceptional visiting directors including Raymond Hawthorne, Richard Campion and Sara Brody. They expected, and Hawke’s Bay was rewarded with, operas of an international standard.”

DIANNE ABRAHAM

numerous, the number of adults involved could be higher. I encourage people to dust off their violin cases, warm up their vocal chords and dig out their trumpets and join one of the wonderful groups in the region.

In the words of Plato, music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything.

BEST BAR IN THE BAY PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF HASTINGS ALL CONSUMING SINCE 2013 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 • BAYBUZZ • 75

Culture FO O D / I A N T H O M AS

Party time!

It’s a form of torture. We all hate it, don’t we?

Forced to stand for hours, in uncomfortably intimate proximity to similarly tortured strangers and acquaintances.

Shuffling from one foot to the other, attempting to extricate ourselves from the corner we’ve been corralled into by the clingy chatterbox, whose speech impediment is that every five minutes they have to stop talking to take a breath.

A form of punishment that would be frowned upon by Amnesty International ensues as we listen disinterestedly to their uninteresting monologue. Thankfully we know we’ll be released in just a few hours.

Little wonder several good big glasses of social lubricant are required to get through the average cocktail party.

Today’s cocktail party brims with wine and beer; the closest thing to a cocktail is a whisky and water. Party food has morphed over the last thirty years from plates to platters, then to charcuterie boards and now grazing tables. Soon, the stainless steel trough will take over as an easy, one-size-fitsall buffet option. A swill of baba ghanoush, tortilla chips, pulled pork, and vegan cheese. Colourful gluttony gone mad, I tell you.

Where has all of the finesse of tinned pineapple and tasty cheese on a toothpick shoved in an orange gone?

We all pine for the food of yesteryear. Beetroot hummus is trendy, bright and cheery, and, if you spoon it into a bowl of your own, a few of your guests, once three deep in chardonnay, will ask for the recipe. It has its issues though; how the hell are we supposed to balance this Levantine ambrosia on a flaccid carrot stick without streaking our latest Anna S creation? It’s a modern day dilemma.

So this begets the question: What food is best to sustain us through to the point at which we feel we can politely leave the party without taramasalata on our moustaches and harissa drizzle down our brand-new linen shirts?

Old-school finger food is the answer.

The clue is in the title. Pleasant smile

Back in the day when the call, “Gentlemen a crate and Ladies a plate”, went out, no one thought of roasting an aubergine or stuffing a zucchini flower and the parties were better for it. firmly affixed, glass in one hand, bitesize food held between thumb and forefinger of the other. It’s a timetested formula used to stop guests from getting too pissed too soon. It doesn’t work with the pre-loaders (or ‘life and soul of the party’ as we used to call them).

The canapes should be no floppier than a blini. That’s the rule. Other rules include: mustn’t require two hands or a plate, and definitely not a fork.

Should not shatter in or on its way to the mouth. Must not be so large as to smudge lipstick or require excessive gaping to insert, nor induce hearty mastication before swallowing. No sloppy sauce.

And that, drumroll please, is the science behind the mythical Kiwi Dip. We are all familiar with the scene: we lean slightly and move our free hand towards the bowl of chips. As our fingers extend we make a snap selection through practiced eyes, choosing the chip with the appropriate saddle in which to cradle the perfect amount of firm creaminess. Then one smooth action to finish and we are back to the “What do you do?” drudgery.

The nibbles of the past generally hark from the same source, the pantry. Back in the day when the call, “Gentlemen a crate and Ladies a plate”, went out, no one thought of roasting an aubergine or stuffing a zucchini flower and the parties were better for it.

There was little pressure to impress because the menu was usually the same. Rolls: sausage and asparagus.

Cheese: with pineapple, creamed with celery sticks, and as straws. Vol au vents: with creamy mushroom filling.

Red sausages: small for kids parties, bigger versions for the grown-ups.

Pavs: nuff said.

We have transitioned from bucolic ‘she’ll-be-right’ menus to colourful, Gramable meze boards.

There have been a few casualties on that journey. A notable also-ran but now seldom-seen element of noughties parties is the once ubiquitous oil and bread partnership or, in better suburbs, the oil, bread and dukkah menage a trois. Likewise the bruschetta and crostini have suffered at the hands of the carb-averse. Scoffing Philly cheese topped with sweet chilli sauce using only a brittle lavosh is irksome, but is still popular in some quarters.

There are party food items that have stood the test of time. Who doesn’t love a mini-pie or quiche? The box of frozen savouries has seen a lot of action over the years, most often served with an unpleasantly sweet tomato sauce. Likewise, popular with the “If you can’t fry it, don’t buy it” mob, prawn twisters and samosas are resilient menu options.

Clearly then, the booze and the grub together save us from social purgatory by emboldening us and sating the hunger of the day. Once fed and ‘watered’ we quite enjoy talking to old what’s his name about whatever it is he does between weekends. Two hours later and we’ve grazed heartily whilst keeping well hydrated with a much better quality beer than the one we brought to the party. The tapenade stain doesn’t bother us as we guffaw loudly, too loudly, at the jokes we tell.

Despite our earnestly professed intentions we have overstayed the allotted cocktail hours and found ourselves with a small group of stalwarts trying, but really too full, to get the dancing going.

It’s nearly midnight as we try to maneuver ourselves into the Uber without dropping the ham sandwich we were told we had to eat. Our fear of carbs and processed meats has been driven from us, but will certainly return with a vengeance near dawn tomorrow.

We love parties.

Photo: Florence Charvin

76 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

Culture B O O KS / LO UI S E WA R D

Armchair travel It looks like it might be a while before we get to travel, right?

Wrong!

As Anna Quindlen says, “Books are the plane, and the train, and the road.

They are the destination, and the journey, ” and she should know. She won a Pulitzer prize and everything.

I’ve been reading a few tomes that have taken me right out of the Bay, into the past, other presents and even the future. It’s been great and I invite you to join me. Haere mai.

Anthony Doerr won a Pulitzer for All the Light We Cannot See. Gosh it was beautiful. How do you follow up such an achievement? With a huge, chunky, 640-page beauty of a novel called Cloud Cuckoo Land. We could argue that we’ve all been there this year, but in this book Doerr conjures up several, related worlds. It hinges around an ancient text by Antonius Diogenes (bit of authorly hubris – why wouldn’t you?) that we read snippets of as we go along, in which a shepherd wishes to be turned into a bird so he can fly to a land of plenty.

Traveling through the story we meet Anna and Omeir in 15th century Constantinople and face poverty, war, discrimination. In the 2000s we hang out with old fella Zeno as he guides a group of children through a stage play of Diogenes’ story, and live his whole life with him: orphan, soldier, translator. In the future, we zoom through space with Konstance, and access the ship’s virtual library with her as she tries to figure out what has happened not only to her family, but to the whole of humanity.

Once you’ve read Cloud Cuckoo Land you will have sweated in the Korean War, made friends with an owl, run through the mountains of Bulgaria, been inside the minds of the most intricately crafted characters trying to fathom what the hell is going on in our beautiful world. You can do it in a week of reading too, so it’ll be just as

78 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

if you’ve been on holiday, but without having to sit next to strangers on a plane.

If there was ever a novel to get you making pasta from scratch and desperately trying to source a bottle of grappa, it’s Still Life by Sarah Winman.

Oh, how I love this book.

We begin with young Ulysses Temper, British soldier. At the end of the second world war he happens upon an art historian, Evelyn Skinner, who always looks ten years younger than she is, which she puts down to cold water swimming. They are in Italy.

They bond, as humans sometimes do, then go their separate ways.

Post war, Ulysses returns to his old haunts in the East End of London to find his wife, Peg, has had a child (not his), the pub’s beloved parrot Claude has been so traumatised by the Blitz that his feathers have fallen out, and his old mate Cress is spending a great deal of time communing with the street’s cherry tree.

There are so many layers to this story, so many people to love. Peg is struggling with ‘the kid,’ Alys, waiting for her American G.I. to return to her. Ulysses steps in, his love for sassy, spiky, kind Peg big enough to encompass wee Alys. Cress potters around supporting everyone, pessimist pub landlord Col tries his best to care for his daughter Ginny and between them all they are the epitome of the bonds of unconditional love and friendship.

The interactions between characters are hilarious – the bickering and the loyalty in good times and in tragedy is wonderfully entertaining.

The novel turns to Italy, Florence in particular and oh, the food, the wine, the people, the architecture. Sun yourself in the piazza, cross the bridges of the Arno, sip your grappa. I defy you not to love this book and lend it to your friends.

A note on a journey none of us will

ever want to make. Abbas Nazari was born in Afghanistan and knew little about the world beyond his village.

After having watched the Taliban creep ever closer, wiping out dissenters and diverse ethnicities, Abbas’s father made the desperate decision to take his family and flee their home.

The family of seven (the youngest child still a baby) travel, at great personal risk, first to Pakistan, then to Indonesia. They manage to secure passage on a boat that will take them to Christmas Island; if they can get there, and claim refugee status, the Australian government have to listen.

The boat is not seaworthy and is desperately overcrowded. It manages to just about make it through a terrifyingly violent storm, and then drifts.

Against all odds, a Norwegian cargo ship, the Tampa, comes to their aid and after some confusing conversations with the Indonesian and Australian authorities, and negotiations with the refugees, the Captain heads for Christmas Island. What happens then is such a travesty of human rights abuses that it’ll leave you fuming.

How Abbas and his family survive, are accepted into Aotearoa by Helen Clark’s government, and eventually thrive will leave you gob-smacked, inspired, ashamed at the racism, warmed by the kindness. Abbas’s book is called After the Tampa, and it’s incredible.

Thank goodness we live in paradise, and when we get the feeling that the grass is greener on the other side but can do little about it, we have books, and they are, as Stephen King says, ‘a uniquely portable magic.’

Enjoy ebooks, audiobooks &

E a

magazines,

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Read on Libby.

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all in one app!

The one-tap reading app from our library.

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Culture MO U T H Y B R OA D / JES S S O UTA R B A RRON

Clive …

Who needs Paris or The Hague?

Clive is the unsung hero of Hawke’s Bay. Stuck between busy, high-flying parents it’s the humble middle child quietly overachieving. Not Napier and hardly Hastings, Clive is a principality all of its own.

Photo: Tom Allan

Sometime between Lockdown 2.0 and Christmas my feet get itchy and I pine for sunny climes. Halcyon days mooching through shops. Sipping macchiato while people watching. Lounging about after a long lunch, alfresco.

Relaxing by the pool, or on the patio with a shandy.

It’s not safe to stray too far for holidays these days and all disposable wedge got used up this year on PPE and craft supplies. So I’m taking my break close to home … in the perfect destination for a relaxing staycation. With its romantic river-side setting in the heart of urbane hubbub, it’s practically the Paris of the East Coast … Clive.

Clive is the unsung hero of Hawke’s Bay. Stuck between busy, high-flying parents it’s the humble middle child quietly overachieving. Not Napier and hardly Hastings, Clive is a principality all of its own.

A week might be a tad too much, but a long weekend is jam-packed when spent in Clive. To begin, a brisk Saturday morning jaunt. Town hall, war memorial, old church, historic home: the self-guided heritage tour is high on the list of must-dos. Up there

80 • BAYBUZZ • NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021

too is the bike-ability of the Shire of Clive. A sojourn along the river includes a landmark bridge, the apex of which presents a panoramic view of the delta right down to the sea. On a good day you can see all the way to the majestic geodesic domes of the East Clive Wastewater Treatment Plant.

Saturday night serves up a jet-setting smorgasbord. With diverse international gastronomic eateries from Holland to Thailand, it’s possible to stay a whole three days without dining in the same place twice. Box Coffee punches above its weight with right-on woke baristas popping out joe faster than you can say, “Please may I have a single origin fair trade organic cold brew with an oat milk chaser”.

Clive Pub is the conjoined twin of River Bar Restaurant famous for its deep-fried Beer Platter (prawn twisters, fish bites, chicken bites, broccoli bites, onion rings). The two venues couldn’t be more different and with various in- and out-side spaces offer a bona-fide pub crawl without leaving the premises.

Sunday, hit the river. Summer is a particularly exciting season with busy boat clubs filling the Clive Riviera with bustle. On these waters winners are made, with multiple golds at the 2021 Olympics having Clive River in their origin story. Waka ama paddlers lift the hoe and get jiggy with the out-riggers while across the river the fine fellows of the Hawke’s Bay Rowing Club (established in 1876) set to with the sculls, the stroke setting the rhythm and coxswains warbling orders

through their cox-box. Hit the river in January and enjoy the HB Rowing Cup Regatta. It’s exactly like Henley.

Clive isn’t just for fun. It has a serious role in pan-city negotiations. With no real dog in any fight, it’s the DMZ, The Hague of Hawke’s Bay. It’s in Clive all top secret deals between our two major metropoles take place. The infamous Romans retired regularly to the Pub after council skirmishes. Over a surreptitious samosa at the Fruit and Vege drive-thru, amalgamationists once met to strategise referendum ploys.

Regional arts, regional sports, regional public-works projects are plotted and planned in the carpark behind Bom Dia. Clive’s not just for getaways either.

Personally, I have both my mechanic and my vet in Clive. Not because I live there, but because I don’t. Clive people are neutral … like the Swiss. They see it all and they say nothing. I am now on the hunt for a dermatologist and an accountant based in Clive.

Often when we holiday we explore lanes and nosey through neighbourhoods imaging our everyday-selves situated in the holiday setting. So too with Clive. From its Clive Terrace row of charming fencible cottages to its lavish riverside mansion-ettes, it’s a desirous locale within an easy walk to the quaint general store (or 4-Square as we say in the colloquial parlance).

We aren’t leaving NZ anytime soon, and planning’s pointless with Covid’s Zeta strain just over the horizon.

Sydney’s light years’ away. Paris?

Impossible. Even Auckland could lockdown at any moment leaving us stranded.

We need to look locally for the adventures we yearn for. We need to find new angles on the familiar. Our own backyard has plenty to offer if you know where to look – or you know how to look – to find what you need.

To muck with an old trope: If you can’t be in the place you love, then love the place you’re in.

10 DEC 14 JAN 4 FEB 25 FEB 18 MAR

5:30–8:30pm Clive Square, Napier.

Come along to enjoy delectable food, refreshments and live music. Meet your friends, bring your family and picnic rug.

Keep an eye on facebook for postponement dates

facebook.com/napiernightfiesta

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