BB#65-Jul-Aug-2022

N 65 • JULY / AUGUST 2022 • HAWKE’S BAY UP CLOSE, IN DEPTH

The cost-of-living crisis hits Hawke’s Bay

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Responding to climate change / Will health reform work? / KA Halliday’s haven / Cashmere – a soft touch / Artists in residence / Pies in the sky / What’s our harvest score?

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65 BayBuzz July/August 2022

Health reorg, inflation, climate change all hitting Hawke’s Bay – here’s how we’re coping. Our food producers take stock. Beware of centralisation. Meet KA Halliday and her home. Two takes on our kids’ literacy – reading & science. Rewilding: nature healing itself. Cashmere – a soft touch. Best TV, best pies, best books, best way to rejuvenate.

Photo: Tom Allan

Follow us at: baybuzzhb Articles online at: baybuzz.co.nz Editorial enquiries editors@baybuzz.co.nz Advertising enquiries Mandy Wilson 027 593 5575 mandy@baybuzz.co.nz Reach BayBuzz by mail BayBuzz, PO Box 8322, Havelock North

About the cover If you’re feeling the pinch in your daily spend, you’re not alone. Even in Hawke’s Bay. At the time of going to print the cost of living had spiralled to 6.9% - the highest in more than 30 years.

An impact felt not only on the purse. The effects of struggling to feed your family – recognised as a basic human right – are also emotional, mental, and physical.

Abby Beswick reveals the weighty costs of financial stress on page 20.

BayBuzz Team EDITOR: Tom Belford C&L EDITOR: Michal McKay SENIOR WRITERS: Kay Bazzard; Tom Belford; Abby Beswick; Rosheen FitzGerald; Michal McKay; Keith Newman; Tess Redgrave COLUMNISTS: Charles Daugherty; Andrew Frame; Fiona Fraser; Kate McLeay; Katie Nimon; Paul Paynter; Dominic Salmon; Jess Soutar Barron; Nick Stewart; Ian Thomas; Louise Ward BUSINESS WRITER: Brenda Newth EDITOR’S RIGHT HAND: Brooks Belford PHOTOGRAPHY: Tom Allan; Florence Charvin ILLUSTRATION: Brett Monteith DESIGN: Unit Design Max Parkes; Giselle Reid ONLINE: Elizabeth-Marie Nes; Lee Tong BUSINESS & DISTRIBUTION MANAGER: Kathleen Botha PRINTING: Blue Star Group

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.

Bee in the know 4 6

From the editor BayBuzz hero – Aimee Fisher Bee in the know

34 Investing in scientifically literate kids Dominic Salmon Local programme interests kids in science.

36 Rewilding: Let nature heal itself Charles Daugherty Nature has terrific self-healing capacity, if we give it a chance.

BayBiz …

42 Hawke’s Bay harvest scorecard Brenda Newth It’s been a tough season for our farmers and growers.

48 Going green in volatile times Nick Stewart Green investing holding its own.

50 Soft gold Fiona Fraser Meet local cashmere maven, Jo Lloyd.

Culture

Ideas & opinions

56 A place to call home Michal McKay Meet the dynamic KA Halliday and her Arts & Crafts haven.

64 Artists in residence Rosheen FitzGerald Get a peek at where local artists make their art.

72 A good read Kay Bazzard A successful programme for children with reading difficulty.

76 Drink the wild air Kate McLeay Nature is restorative … drink it in.

78 Pie in the sky Ian Thomas What’s more personal than the ‘perfect’ pie?

79 The other way Louise Ward Books featuring human resilience.

80 Mouthy Broad Jess Soutar Barron TV bingeing.

32 Centralisation? Bah humbug!

Paul Paynter Do we lose our ability to learn from mistakes and innovation?

CORRECTION: BayBuzz would like to apologise that the painting ‘The Fat Boys’ by Joanna Braithwaite (page 69 in the May/June issue) was incorrectly credited to Pamela Wolf.

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Features 12 Face to face with climate change in Hawke’s Bay Tom Belford With Government policies becoming clear, how will our region be affected?

20 Cost-of-living crisis hits Hawke’s Bay Abby Beswick If your purse isn’t feeling the strain, count your blessings.

26 Our future health Tess Redgrave With massive reorg just beginning, local practitioners wary.

2 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

64 Dali Susanto. Photo: Florence Charvin

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 3

F R O M T H E EDI TO R TO M BEL FO R D

If you are into local politics, the window between 15 July and 12 August should be intriguing. That’s when candidates intending to stand for our five local councils must flag their intentions.

Having done this myself a few times, with mixed success, it’s not something to undertake lightly.

If you haven’t already got a public profile, it’s tough to start from scratch given a 6-8 week campaign window and a blizzard of other candidates’ brochures and billboards to compete against. And if you do have a public profile, you’re lucky if that doesn’t attract an undue share of personal potshots via social media from ‘citizens’ you’ve never met and would never want to!

And finally, if you’re a newbie to the process, you’ll be competing against a host of incumbents determined to hold their seats and probably better known than you to the 40-45% of eligible voters who will actually vote. As I write, I’m aware of only three councillors across the five councils who will not be standing for re-election; I’d be shocked if the eventual number exceeds five or six.

So it’s an uphill climb, but a hugely important opportunity to serve your community and help shape its direction … hopefully bringing pertinent experience and a transparent attitude to the table.

Two big changes are occurring in this election cycle. Both Hastings District Council and the Regional Council have added dedicated Māori seats to their tables, to be elected only by those

registered and voting on the Māori roll.

So for non-Māori voters the election change itself will be invisible; the results will not be – two extra faces on the HBRC; three on HDC. And of course the Government’s health reorganisation has eliminated elected DHBs, so your ballot will be a bit less populated.

Which brings me to one of the main features in this magazine, Our future health, where Tess Redgrave writes on the Government’s health reorganisation, which officially began clicking into place on July 1st. She reports on the main features and goals of the reorg, along with some initial expectations from local practitioners.

If it’s not health you’re most worried about, then for sure it’s inflation. Abby Beswick’s feature, Cost of living crisis hits Hawke’s Bay, provides a local take on that, including sources of help to cope if you need it.

Our food producing sector is now in its winter season of re-grouping. From blueberries to beef, Brenda Newth’s Hawke’s Bay harvest scorecard assesses how the region has managed its labour, supply chain, weather and other challenges.

And for ‘big picture’ worriers, there’s my article, Face to face with climate change in Hawke’s Bay. I’ve tried to show how our emerging national climate policies will most affect this region, and what some of our key players here are already doing in anticipation.

Plus admonishments from Paul Paynter about dreaded ‘centralisation’. Dom Salmon on our kids’ science

(il) literacy. Charles Daugherty urging us to let nature rewild.

So I’m afraid we’ve cooked up a bit of a ‘winter worries’ edition to go with the season’s gray skies.

But there is relief and uplift as well!

Take a peek at KA Halliday’s gorgeous home. At the studios of some of our leading artists. At Jo Lloyd’s timeless cashmere. Kerri Thompson’s terrific ‘readaloud’ literacy initiative.

Read about Jess Barron’s TV escapes.

Ian Thomas’ ‘best pie’ search. Kate McLeay’s paean to the outdoors. Nick Stewart’s advice on green investing.

Louise Ward’s books of inspiration.

And plenty of bits and pieces to remind you Hawke’s Bay isn’t such a bad place to call home.

Enjoy!

Tom Belford

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.

BayBuzz is subject to the New Zealand Media Council. Complaints to be first directed in writing, within one month of publication, to editors@baybuzz.co.nz.

If unsatisfied, the complaint may be pursued with the Media Council at: info@mediacouncil.org.nz. Further detail and complaints form are available at www.mediacouncil.org.nz.

4 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

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BAY B UZ Z H E R O

Photo: Alphapix

Aimee Fisher Aimee Fisher has worked diligently to stake her claim on the kayaking world stage.

Fisher has been a New Zealand representative since her Karamu High School years but made it to the Olympics by age 21; the youngest in the team at the time.

While Hawke’s Bay is renowned for breeding good rowers, Fisher decided to pick up a kayak, and her Karamu High School community couldn’t be prouder. Just check out their video tribute for her, it doesn’t get much more heartwarming than that. She’s fondly known as Fish, which makes

6 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

sense given her entry into the sport was fishing from the back of a canoe on Lake Tūtira with her dad.

It makes even more sense that she got into Canoe Polo while at Mahora Primary School. Even if she wasn’t zoned for Karamu High, she would have made her way to the school that’s known for its canoe polo programme, which Fisher rightly points out was conveniently located across the road from the Canoe Polo pool by Splash Planet.

Canoe polo was what she enjoyed, and kayaking was a good way to cross train, but only one of them gets you to the Olympics. After winning an ‘Under 15’ national kayaking title, that Olympic goal became a possibility. Four years

later, she moved to Auckland to join the senior team, and the rest is history.

In May, two years after Fisher made the decision to leave the New Zealand national squad she lost a threerace head-to-head showdown with Lisa Carrington for the single world championship berth in Canada later this year. Nonetheless, Fisher reigns as K1-500m world champion, winning in Copenhagen last year.

Fisher’s move from canoe polo, to K4, to K1 illustrates her pursuit of personal best. Chasing the perfect paddle and seeing what is possible for an individual to achieve. We’re betting it’s more than we can imagine. Aimee Fisher is no ordinary athlete!

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B E E I N T HE K N OW / M I C H A L MC K AY

Annie Heast, chair of the Edible Fashion Awards Board stands beside Shitaki, created by Emilie-Rose Wood – winner of the 2021 Nurture Designer Category. Inspired by Asian fashion and cuisine it is made of a serviette, cheese cloth and cornstarch mache, chilli, garlic, lotus root and leaves, lime, shitaki mushrooms, galangai, hawthorn berries, scampi, crabs and bamboo leaves which are traditionally used to wrap food.

Photographed at Muse Gallery by Florence Charvin.

Growing talent The Edible Fashion Awards have come a long way since 2006 when around 60 children from all round the district gathered under the Hastings Town Clock to stage their entries.

Now it attracts some 200 plus.

All potential designers from both schools and après in a bid to win the Supreme Award: their entries derived from anything which relates to edible material – be it recycled or fresh produce, original materials conjured out of edible ingredients plus packaging and products of all kinds so long as they come under the category of the rather broad-brush moniker – Edible.

This year the show will go on at the end of August. After the multiple entries in each category have been sifted down Charvin during the twoPhoto: daysFlorence prior, finalists will

8 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

be judged in a spectacular at Toitoi on the night of August 26th.

Overseeing the intricacies of this exceptional production is Annie Heast, who took the mantle of board chair in September last year. Annie is well used to being around the behind stage secrets such an event involves.

Husband Andy is chair of the Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival.

However she comes to the role with a pedigree all of her own. With multiple qualifications and a degree in the health sector – ward sister, Health Science, NHS management training for future directors and chief execs. It includes three years as chief operating officer of the Hawke’s Bay DHB and seven as a board management consultant for many DHBs including HB. After that she was

ready for a break.

“Voltaire had a lot to do with that,” she comments. “I read Candide and found gardening. That was it.” Until last year when she decided she wanted to return to the workforce – “I had forgotten how much I loved leading a team. So, I put it ‘out there’ and within 24 hours along came the offer to head the Edible Fashion Awards Board.

“I also wanted to do something outside of the health sector – my interests are food and gardening, and I felt the need to help in the areas of creativity and education.” The ‘fit’ was perfect.

Schools’ participation is a huge and vital part of this charity – giving opportunities and encouragement to the undiscovered talent in the region. The education programme behind the threeday event with its multiple categories has offered many a talented school child the opportunity to discover their skills.

Dedicated mentors – often past winners themselves – are part of a course of scheduled visits which encourage both groups and individuals at participating schools to reach the heights with their entries.

But Annie also has great plans for the development of the charity. A two-day workshop is to be held after the show where the best of the Bay creatives and management gurus will explore just how far it can develop. “We need to find out what the potential is out there – look at who we are, what we are about and to what we are aligned. But whatever we do Hawke’s Bay will be its heart. After all, look at the abundance of creativity and productivity we have here.”

Funding in the way of sponsorship and donations is an essential part of this growth.

“Of course could we do none of this without the wonderfully diverse and highly qualified people we have on board,” Annie comments. “A brilliant production team headed by our exceptional event director Kelie Jensen, the incredible volunteers and of course board members who bring a range of skills so necessary to create the unique charity that is Edible –theatre, music and film production, education, psychotherapy, editorial, food, finance, civic knowledge and management.

“Great things grow here and that is not only in produce – we have promise in so many fields and what we – the Edible board – are determined to do is grow this festival to its full potential by nurturing the latent skills which are lurking in every field of creativity in the region.” www.ediblefashionawards.co.nz

BEE I N T H E K N OW / K AT I E NI M ON

If you’ve found a home you love but you’re not sure what the next steps are, ask me.

It’s all about asking the right questions.

Andrea at Teresa Cocktail Bar. Photo: Florence Charvin

Accolades for new Napier bar There’s quite a lot that’s new in Napier, but one that stands out is Teresa Cocktail Bar. Harvest Deli by day, Teresa Cocktail Bar by night. Hidden behind a painting at the back of the Deli, you’ll find creative new cocktails and all the classics.

Inspired by the Italian aperitivo, Teresa is a place to come together for conversation, and stimulate the appetite. Brainchild of Sarah Mitchell

and Andrea Marseglia, Teresa has quickly become ‘the place to be’ in Napier, and the critics don’t disagree.

Teresa has been named as a finalist in the Spirited Awards, as one of Asia Pacific’s 10 Best New International Cocktail Bars, featuring alongside bars in Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Sydney, and Melbourne.

That’s not the only accolade Teresa has achieved recently. Co-owner Marseglia was named as the Rising Talent at the Cuisine Magazine Good Food Awards for 21/22. One more reason to love Teresa, they’ve released bottled cocktails. So, if you can’t get a seat, you can take your cocktail to go.

I know what questions to ask and what answers you should be looking for on your real estate journey.

If you’d like to have a discussion about the buying or selling process, I would love to hear from you, so give me a call.

027 273 0446 sophie.sheild-barrett@hbnzsir.com

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BEE I N T HE K N OW / K AT I E N I MO N

Historic Municipal Building reopened The renovation that’s been in the making for nearly seven years is finally open for business. The Hastings Municipal Building, next door to Toitoi, formerly the Hawke’s Bay Opera House, is the last piece in the Arts and Events Centre puzzle.

With doors open in July, the new area of the creative arts precinct is reminiscent of an Italian Palazzo. The laneway, the architecture, and the many layers of culture provide just the cherry to put on top of Hastings City’s dynamic cake. The building is now home to some exciting new businesses. Newcomers Craft & Social (eatery and bar), Cellar 495 (boutique wine cellar and bar), Long Island Delicatessen, and Ākina Gallery are joined by the revamped Hastings i-SITE, and a ticketing box office.

As it’s part of the Arts and Events Centre, there will of course be multiple spaces to hire, including the fully refurbished Assembly Ballroom. With the 34-room Quest popping up next door, there’s going to be a lot going on in Hastings for the next wee while.

ABOVE: Sacha van den Berg of Ākina Gallery in the Hastings Municipal Building. Photo: Giselle Reid RIGHT: Bruce Mactaggart. Photo: Tom Allan

Mitre 10 Park – Olympic pool Have you seen it? Perhaps you’ve driven the expressway recently. Maybe you’re a regular at Mitre 10 Park. Honestly, if you’ve not been in the area for a while, you’d be forgiven for not having the faintest idea of what was going on. One day it was a car park; now it’s an almost complete Regional Aquatic Centre (due to open mid-August). Being agile and prepared certainly helped when the Government announced there was money up for grabs for “shovel ready projects” under the Covid Response and Recovery Fund.

Bruce Mactaggart, Founding Trustee and Deputy Chair of the Hawke’s Bay Community Fitness Centre Trust (launched by Sir Graeme Avery) is now the Trustee responsible for managing the construction of the Aquatic Centre.

Truly, the Trust couldn’t have someone more qualified to lead this project.

Before moving to New Zealand in 2004, Mactaggart was the general manager at Melbourne and Olympic Parks. He then took on the role of chief executive at Vector (now Spark) Arena, seeing it through from design to completion, and subsequently took over part ownership in the years following. Since moving to Hawke’s Bay, Mactaggart has put years of energy into developing Hawke’s Bay Hockey, among many other pursuits.

Mactaggart points out that the Regional Aquatic Centre was always part of the long-term vision for the Hawke’s Bay Community Fitness Centre. So, in this case, preparation won $32 million in funding from the

government. It was among the most shovel ready of shovel ready projects and became one of the first as part of the government’s initiative.

The project aimed to provide 166 jobs, but the Trustee points out something more interesting: manhours. The build, managed by Apollo Projects (which has since set up shop in Hawke’s Bay), will have amassed over 130,000 man-hours in 20 months.

Once complete, the $32 million build will be the largest aquatic complex in New Zealand, adding $70-80 million in assets to the Trust, and jobs for up to 60 staff across the facility. The build is currently running on time and on budget, which is almost unheard of in 2022.

The Centre includes a 51.5m Olympicsize pool, a 25m learn-to-swim pool, two hydrotherapy pools, and two multi-purpose meeting rooms. The buzzword for this venue is versatility.

The 51.5m pool has a moveable bulking which can be used split in half for short course events (hence the extra meter and a half in length). The 25m pool could be for learning to swim, but also short events, or warmups. With the inclusion of the outdoor aquatic facility providing a total six event pools, the complex could play host to the Canoe Polo World Championships.

Built to an elite standard, with capacity for 1,500 spectators, and the development of the new hostel on the same site, the Centre will be set up to host many regional, national and world events in the coming years.

Young cheerleader punching above her weight

Thought Cheerleading was just for Americans? Think again. Hawke’s Bay local, Caitlyn Stillman, is set to take on the world’s best in May next year at the Global Cheer Games in Hawaii. Last year, Stillman was individual New Zealand Grand Champion, and is currently ranked 5th in Australasia, and she’s only 13.

It doesn’t stop there. She’s competitive in Hockey, Canoe Polo, Dance, and Orienteering; it’s no wonder she was awarded the Year 7/8 Sportsperson of the Year Award at Woodford House in 2021. While she’s training four nights a week and raising money for next years’ event in Hawaii, the Cheerleader of 9 years has high hopes of getting a Cheer scholarship to attend college in the United States when she finishes school. Stillman is based out of the award-winning Bay City Cheer in Onekawa.

Photo: Tom Allan

Industrial Processes 6.5%

Waste 5.1%

Fugitive Emissions 2.3% Dairy Cattle 22.9%

Electricity Generation 4.2%

Other 4.9%

Manufacturing & Construction 8.1%

Sheep 11.9%

Other 2.0%

Transport 21.5%

Road Transport 19.1%

Energy 40.5%

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Beef Cattle 8.1% Other 4.9%

Face to face with climate change in Hawke’s Bay

Agriculture 47.8%

Climate Update by Tom Belford Methane 18.9%

Nitrous Oxide 4.1%

Methane 10.7%

Nitrous Oxide 1.1%

Methane 6.1% Nitrous Oxide 1.1%

New Zealand’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions Source: New Zealand’s Greenhouse Gas Inventory 1990-2018, published April 2020

After what has seemed like an endless procession of target-setting, establishing a Climate Change Commission, interim reports, nation-wide consultations, draft discussion documents and more targets, it seems that New Zealand – or at least our current Government – is (almost) ‘ready to roll’ on mitigating greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and adapting to climate change.

And Hawke’s Bay is snapping to attention as well.

The Government’s official Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) for the next three-year window has been released, with $4.5 billion raised by the Emissions Trading Scheme earmarked for climate-related programmes.

I note ‘almost’ ready because the Government still must make its final decisions regarding agricultural emissions, the elephant in NZ’s GHG room.

More on that in a moment.

See the diagram opposite for our current profile.

The ambitiousness or intensity of NZ’s GHG reduction effort is driven by the degree to which our Government in power and citizens perceive and

support a need for our country to ‘do its part’, or even provide leadership, as a global citizen in addressing this global existential threat.

On the international stage, countries are expected to declare and meet ‘Nationally Determined Contributions’ to reducing and/or offsetting their carbon emissions.

In any scenario for NZ, we will need to shop aggressively overseas for carbon offsets (e.g., planting trees in Indonesia), given the scale of our agriculture-generated emissions, especially biogenic methane. For these offsets, we will pay $6-14 billion. The alternative is far deeper domestic reductions in GHG emissions at costs to the economy and forced changes in our consumer behaviour that are deemed politically unacceptable.

As a nation, we might respond out of a sense of inter-generational and planetary moral duty, or perhaps more to avoid being ostracized as a political and trading partner by countries committed to heavier lifting.

The latest UN projections in April paint a dire picture, said the report.

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 13

Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of climate change “… limiting warming to around 1.5°C (2.7°F) requires global greenhouse gas emissions to peak before 2025 at the latest, and be reduced by 43% by 2030; at the same time, methane would also need to be reduced by about a third. Even if we do this, it is almost inevitable that we will temporarily exceed this temperature threshold but could return to below it by the end of the century. “It’s now or never, if we want to limit global warming to 1.5°C (2.7°F),” said Jim Skea, co-chair of the IPCC Working Group for this report.

“Without immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, it will be impossible.”

Will NZ do its part? No, according to our Climate Change Commission.

The Commission finds that the Government’s commitment (under the Paris Agreement, the current global benchmark) to reduce net emissions by an average of 30% from 2005 emissions levels over the 2021-2030 period is not compatible with global efforts to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.

The Commission observes: “If Aotearoa is to play its part as a developed nation, the NDC (Nationally Determined Contribution) would need to be strengthened to reflect emission reductions of much more than 35% below 2005 levels by 2030.”

Such increased reductions would go beyond the pathways the Commission has recommended for NZ at present.

And so the Commission kicks this to touch: “We consider that these judgements, and the decision on the level of international commitment, should be made by the elected government of the day.”

Which returns us to the Government’s ERG, which most environmentalists argue falls short of the urgent action required.

However, the focus of this article is not the ‘macro’ situation, but rather on the changes that announced or likely Government policies might have on our activities right here in Hawke’s Bay. And what we can do here to confront the issue.

At first blush, this brings us directly to that elephant – on-farm emissions.

Our local profile

Hawke’s Bay, which at 3.1 kilotonnes of CO2e accounts for only 4% of NZ’s total GHG emissions, can take some satisfaction over reducing our regional

14 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Sequestering carbon in the soil could prove to be more economically and environmentally rewarding than planting plantation pine forests, a path most farmers are keen to avoid.

emissions by 7.1% over the 2007-2018 (latest official stats available).

For now, our best regional snapshot of Hawke’s Bay’s GHG profile is derived by extrapolating from national statistics. If the nation’s total dairy herd emits X tonnes of methane, then HB’s herd must emit its proportionate share.

The same with auto emissions, etc.

On that basis, in Hawke’s Bay, agriculture accounted for 65.5% of our GHG emissions, while methane accounted for 61.9% of our total emissions. As a region driven by primary production, not surprisingly it’s livestock generating the biggest portion of our emissions.

The policy settings that will dictate the emissions reduction behaviour of HB farmers and growers is outside regional control. By law, all farming operations in NZ must have measured their GHG emissions by the end of this year, and have mitigation plans in place by 2025. There is cross-party agreement on methane targets – as mandated by the Zero Carbon Act, biogenic methane emissions from agriculture (and waste) are to be 10% lower by 2030 and 24-47% lower by 2050 (compared to 2017 levels).

NZ is also signatory to the Global Methane Pledge coming out of the UN Climate Conference last November in Scotland. Signatories to the Pledge are committed to a collective goal of reducing global methane emissions by at least 30% from 2020 levels by 2030.

By the end of this year, one way or the other the Government will set a price on farming-related emissions, perhaps accepting the recommendations of a sector-wide proposal coming out of the primary sector’s He Waka Eke Noa (HWEN) consultation and negotiating process. HWEN accepts that there will be farm-level GHG pricing, with levies beginning in 2025. The new elephant in the room is pricing.

That price will determine how strongly farmers and growers are ‘incentivised’ to reduce their emissions

and how quickly. Importantly, the price cannot be set without an eye to global economics. The latest World Bank analysis of national carbon taxes and carbon trading offsets finds that less than 4% of global emissions are currently covered by a direct carbon price in the range needed by 2030 to meet the temperature goal of the Paris Agreement. The Bank says NZ’s prices might need to double.

Our region’s farmers and growers will decide how they can best reduce or offset their GHG emissions. And we do have some ability here in the region to shape what those responses might look like.

HWEN anticipates that there would be an ‘approved’ list of emission-reducing changes (e.g. genetics, feeds, technology) that if adopted would qualify for financial relief.

But not yet included are so-called ‘regenerative’ farming practices, which have demonstrated the ability to build and store carbon in the soil. Here in Hawke’s Bay, a project supported by the HB Future Farming Trust has established that regen practices have increased soil carbon significantly. To further build the evidence base, the Trust plans to replicate this measuring and monitoring regime across a number of ‘paired’ pastoral farms (conventional vs regen) across HB. This is not a minor matter.

Sequestering carbon in the soil could prove to be more economically and environmentally rewarding than planting plantation pine forests, a path most farmers are keen to avoid.

Referring to the significantly more soil carbon (64 tonne/ha) in the HB regen dairy farm studied, soil scientist Paul Smith notes: “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.” And that is indeed the long-term goal of Beef + Lamb NZ. Moreover, carbon-rich soils retain much more water, a not incidental co-benefit!

Our region’s expected impacts from global warming reach well beyond pastoral farming. NZ’s first National Climate Risk Assessment observed: “The primary sector faces risks from extreme events and ongoing, gradual

changes. Climate change will reduce the quality and quantity of output across many areas including horticulture, viticulture, agriculture and forestry.

Changes in temperature and seasonality influence maturation, length of growing season and the quality (size, shape, taste) of horticulture products; the distribution of pests and diseases and the efficacy of some pest control agents.

The assessment noted that Māori economy would be especially impacted, given its focus on primary production industries.

But while climate change and on-farm GHG emissions are becoming a really big deal to HB’s farmers and growers, and will reshape what the region produces and how, what about the majority of HB residents … townies who don’t get much dirt under their fingernails? What does GHG reduction mean to them?

So, what are we doing?

Starting with local government …

Ironically, the region’s biggest current investment in responding to climate change relates to flood control – global warming will result in more severe and more frequent weather events.

In August 2020, the Government

“Over a third of our household emissions relate to our transport choices; and around a quarter relate to choices we make about what we eat or drink.”

HBRC CLIMATE AMBASSADOR, PIPPA MCKELVIE-SEBILEAU

announced $19.2 million in ‘climate resilience’ funding coming to Hawke’s Bay for four flood protection programmes, including Heretaunga Plains (where 80% of the population lives); Wairoa River Scheme (Ferry Road); and two stretches of the Upper Tukituki.

And in terms of planning attention, the coastal protection strategy, focused on our coastline from Westshore to Clifton, has identified protection measures ranging from ‘hard engineering’ to ‘managed’ or ‘planned’ retreat.

This planning process, now in HBRC’s hands to implement, is rated most advanced in NZ. Hundreds of millions in protective measures will be on the table over the next 50 years.

Both of these initiatives fall into the ‘adaptation’ column. But that’s hardly all – or even the most critical – we must do. Where the rubber meets the road is ‘mitigation’ – actually reducing our GHG emissions.

The Regional Council has set a goal for the region – achieving net zero emissions by 2050. HBRC completed the first assessment of its own corporate emissions in December 2020, and now publicly reports on these regularly.

None of our territorial councils yet do this although there are noises about this happening for NCC and HDC. HBRC has named a Climate Ambassador, who has begun to assemble benchmark data and an ‘Action Network’ of fellow organisational travellers, and NCC a Climate Resilience officer. A similar role appears in the cards for HDC as it begins to implement its ‘Eco-District’ Strategy.

From the starting point of knowing their own ‘corporate’ carbon footprint, based on work being undertaken by HBRC, by year’s end each of HB’s four ‘territories’ will have their own carbon footprint estimates, built from the bottom up, looking at what emission-producing activities actually occur in each jurisdiction.

Changing the face of dentistry.

Neuroplasticity – we now know that our brains are constantly rewiring themselves. What does this have to do with dentistry?

Often people do not visit the dentist because of negative past experiences. At Smilehaus we aim to help everyone achieve optimal oral health.

So we focus on recreating positive experiences in a dental environment. We go to great lengths to help people replace old dental memories with new reassuring ones; where the patient is in control and the dental team is there to help in whatever way they can. That’s why we do things like have our therapy dog Rewa on site, to help ease any dental anxiety.

Whatever it takes to help you take back control on your journey to dental health.

Smilehaus, keeping Hawke’s Bay smiling FAMILY DENTAL / COSMETIC / HYGIENIST 92 Te Mata Road, Havelock North

06 877 7278 | smilehaus.nz

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 15

Back to the adage: You can’t change what you don’t measure.

And this will enable a focus on what local businesses and major enterprises (like the hospital, EIT and our schools) are doing to reduce their carbon footprint. And what you and I should do as consumers.

I suspect many of us would be surprised at the extent of business leadership in the region on this front. Here are a few examples.

Napier Port is committed to net zero emission by 2050 and has an extensive sustainability programme to back that up.

Hawke’s Bay Airport trumps the Port, committing to net zero by 2030.

Ours is the first regional airport in NZ to achieve an international standard – Airport Carbon Accreditation Level 2.

A key aspect of the Airport’s strategy is construction of a 24.2 megawatt solar array on its site, capable of powering the airport and more.

Given the importance of meat production to the region, the plans of Silver Fern Farms are especially noteworthy.

SFF was the first red meat company in NZ to adopt a sustainability programme, 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: 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.

Hence the PM pitches SFF’s ‘Zero carbon Angus beef’ to Americans via Stephen Colbert’s ‘Late Show’.

Then there’s another HB product, wine. Most of it is bottled by Hastingsbased WineWorks. Last December founder Tim Nowell-Usticke told BayBuzz: “We committed to Carbon Zero a year ago, and this is in response to the whole wine industry recognising that sustainability is seen as a very important plank in our export customers’ buying decisions.

“So not only does it help us sell our product, but from our team’s perspective it is the right thing to do. We have started with a 30% net reduction per annum, which we are achieving, and a year ago we started investing in carbon credits here in NZ (native plantations) to offset to Carbon Zero.”

I have no doubt other HB companies are stepping up as well (and would love to hear from you). Civic responsibility and smart business go hand in hand.

Better use of energy and less waste of all kinds yield better bottom lines both commercially and environmentally.

It would be great to see a bit of healthy competition arise – in full public view, perhaps with a ‘scorecard’ reported by HBRC – as our local companies out do each other saving money and the planet.

That leaves you and me

Two years ago, the Regional Council surveyed residents on their climate change awareness and concerns. When asked, ‘How concerned are you about the impact of climate change in our region?’, 29% replied ‘somewhat concerned’ and

33% ‘very concerned’. An OK starting point, but we need to do better.

Our ‘contribution’ to global warming is as consumers. And chiefly we drive petrol and diesel vehicles, heat the air around our poorly-insulated homes, and generate enormous amounts of waste.

In 2018, transport emissions made up 36.3% of total long-lived gases.

The Climate Commission noted that emissions from domestic transport have continued to rise even as emissions from other sectors stabilised or decreased. It said NZ can cut almost all transport emissions by 2050 because the technology already exists and is improving fast.

Commendably the Government has incentivised electric vehicle purchases and will disincentivise gas guzzlers. Conversion to EVs is picking up nicely, but they are still a very small share of the car pool.

The Climate Commission said: “We want to see the majority of the vehicles coming into New Zealand for everyday use electric by 2035.” And recommended that no further internal combustion engine (ICE) light vehicles should be imported after 2032.

The Government’s ERP ducked that recommendation.

Meantime six major automakers, accounting for one-quarter of global sales, have announced end-dates to their production of ICE vehicles, and 30 countries have announced phase-out dates.

The European Parliament is considering a total ban by 2035 of ICE vehicles.

Whether we like it or not, in a generation or less, we’ll be all-EV. If you’re not ready or can’t afford to

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16 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

drive electric, you can always drive less! One study by the University of Auckland study estimates if just 5% of all short, vehicle-based urban trips were done by bike it would save about 22 million litres of fuel and reduce GHG emissions by about 54,000 tonnes. This would be the equivalent of permanently taking 18,000 cars off the road.

Given our geographic spread, HB will never be a bastion of public transportation, but we have made an impressive investment in recreational cycling; we need to do the same with regard to work and chore cycling. And hopefully the current MyWay experiment, offering ‘on-demand’ van transportation, will spread in our urban centres. Finally, the buses we do have will all be required electric after 2026.

With respect to other consumption, we simply need to DO LESS as the project launched by AlexTylee and George Miller urges. www.projectdoless.nz In economically ‘well-off’ countries like NZ, each person accounts for 19 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year. To stabilise global temperature at 1.5C, that number would need to

be around 2.3 tonnes.

So, before we wave our fingers at cows, we might consider the methane we humans produce via our food waste. According to UN data, 20-30% of food produced is wasted. If global food waste and loss were a country, it would be the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases on Earth.

New Zealanders generate the fourth highest amount of waste per person in the OECD. The amount of rubbish New Zealanders have sent to municipal landfills over the last decade has increased by a staggering 48% – some 740kg per person. In HB there is a disproportionately high volume of organic waste, which produces the nasty gases, going to landfill due to the amount of primary industry in the region.

The waste from residents of Napier and Hastings – 86,000 tonnes/yr – goes to the Omaruni Landfill, which at least has the distinction of operating a waste-to-energy project. It turns methane into electricity, producing about 1000 kilowatts of electricity a year, sold back into the grid, enough to power about 1000 homes for a year.

But local experts say half of that waste could be easily recycled or composted.

HBRC Climate Ambassador Pippa

McKelvie-Sebileau notes: “Everything that is brought into the house brings with it the emissions related to its production and functioning. If we’re going to think about individual and household actions we can all take, it can be useful to think about emissions this way. Over a third of our household emissions relate to our transport choices; and around a quarter relate to choices we make about what we eat or drink.

“Luckily, these are easier things to tackle. In many cases, we can choose to fly less, use public transport, car pool, walk or bike, or to reduce the number of trips by car that we make.

We can think about the food we buy and try to choose products that have been locally produced. While this alone won’t solve the climate crisis, they do give us a sense of control and hope and can greatly reduce our household consumption profiles.”

Remember that regional profile at the start of this article, with HB reducing its emissions by 7.1%? In that same window, household emissions in HB rose 9.4%!

In short, curbing global warming is not all about producers, we consumers are the other side of the carbon ledger.

Changes to possum control in Hawke’s Bay? Tukua mai ō whakaaro

Have your say

hbrc.govt.nz Submissions close on Sunday 31 July 2022

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 17

L E XUS A DVE RTO R I A L

Not a toy!

Our personal transportation is one opportunity for each of us to reduce our carbon footprint. Yes, there’s the bus, the bike, the e-bike, but for most of us the challenge still comes from our petrol-powered auto.

So I took up an offer to ‘test’ drive a Lexus UX300e, the electric vehicle offered by Lexus of Hawke’s Bay. Three words sum up my experience.

Smooth. Supersonic. Silent.

I haven’t driven a ‘high end’ car since moving to New Zealand, and so was a bit out of touch with the amenities I assume are now ‘standard’ on all such vehicles … petrol and electric.

Automatic everything, from locks to touchscreens to low/high beams to corrective steering.

But putting all those features aside, I settled in for a weekend of EV experience, with my ‘fuel’ gauge telling me I had enough battery for 300 kilometres. The listed range is 360kms from the car’s 54.35kw battery (total power output of 150kw/201hp), but Oliver my Lexus sherpa told me 300320kms was more likely in normal HB driving conditions.

So, let’s cut right to the chase … range anxiety. Since the car was a loaner, I had neither a home charger to

18 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

fall back on, nor an account with one of the nationwide EV charging networks.

Consequently, I was quite attentive to my battery reading!

Nevertheless, I did quite few trips from home base near the Red Bridge – out to Hygge in Clifton, over to Napier, a jaunt to Clive and into Hastings, and a couple of trips into Havelock village and back.

The normal stuff of a weekend. And returned the car with nearly 90kms left on the battery indicator (having covered a bit over 200kms on the odometer). Over two nights I could have readily recharged if I had a home charger. So, no problem at all with day-to-day range. Anxiety cured.

My favourite gadget on this Lexus EV was the virtual ‘instrument panel’ that appeared to sit outside my windscreen above the hood of the car, just below my normal driving line of sight. It displayed just a view basics – the current speed limit (and whether I was over it), my speed, my remaining driving range, and my position in the roadway (the visual reinforcement of the auto-steering).

I felt like I was in the cockpit of a fighter jet. And this feeling was totally reinforced by the power of this EV. Instantly responsive to pushing the accelerator pedal, the car surged

ahead. With the power and the ‘cockpit’ effect combined, I felt like – given enough runway – I could have taken off!

With amazing smoothness. No gears shifting – just seamless acceleration.

Then, backing off the ‘gas’ pedal (but not braking), smooth deceleration as the motor automatically kicks in to slow the car and charge the battery in the process. The auto-braking feature could be set at four levels of ‘intensity’ to suit the driver.

And it all happens … noiselessly. So noiseless that the car has an ‘artificial noise’ feature you can turn on if you wish a reminder that you are in a moving automobile.

I’m a huge proponent of EVs. But I have to admit, I thought of them still as kind of ‘toy cars’ for those of us more concerned with GHG gas emissions than driving performance. Nice to putter around town in at 30 or 50kph.

However, this Lexus EV has totally changed my perception. Motorheads take note: this EV delivers more than enough power … in fact, your cockpit ‘over the limit’ signal is likely to get a workout until you get used to it!

Not that I encourage speeding, but if you occasionally put ‘pedal to the metal’, with an EV you’ll be doing it guilt free, at least as far as emissions are concerned.

Subscribe to the best thinking in the Bay. 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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Cost-of-living crisis hits Hawke’s Bay

If standing at the checkout, waiting to find out the cost of your weekly shop has become an anxiety-inducing activity, you’re not alone. The cost of living has become Kiwis’ biggest worry, according to a Consumer NZ survey – surpassing previous national concerns of Covid-19 and rising house prices.

Story by Abby Beswick Photos by Florence Charvin

The amount of money needed to cover basic expenses such as housing, food and petrol has spiralled out of reach for a growing number of Kiwis, including here in Hawke’s Bay, where locals are feeling the strain.

In Hastings a mother goes hungry so her children can eat, a couple from Flaxmere regularly have to choose between eating and fueling their car, and in Napier a double income family queues for the first time to receive rescue food. As living costs soar, citizens are making heartbreaking sacrifices simply to survive.

Inflation at a three-decade high

None of us have escaped the growing cost of living. Inflation has hit 6.9% — the highest rate in more than thirty years, according to Statistics NZ, and it’s showing no sign of slowing. The figure follows an annual increase of 5.9% in the December 2021 quarter.

Driven by an increase in housing and petrol prices, the cost of living for the average household has grown significantly in recent years. Construction firms have experienced supply chain issues, as well as higher labour costs and demand, pushing up the cost of building new houses, according to the Consumers Price Index. Climbing prices for rental properties have also had an impact.

While New Zealand is not alone, with many other OECD countries experiencing higher inflation, this is little comfort to the growing number of people struggling to make ends meet.

“I’ve heard people saying the reason they’re eating is because they come to us.”

CHRISTINA MCBETH, NOURISHED FOR NIL

Suffering at the check-out

Keeping our tummies full has become significantly harder in the past year.

High food prices are making for misery at the checkouts, with a growing proportion of people struggling to afford their grocery bills.

Statistics NZ figures show annual food prices remain elevated, following a 10-year high in March. In April this year, food prices were 6.4% higher compared to the same month last year. This was due to increases across all food categories including grocery items, which increased 6.4%, restaurant meals and ready-to-eat food, 5.3%; fruit and vegetables, 9.4%; meat, poultry and fish, 8.1% and non-alcoholic drinks, 2.8%.

Restaurant meals and ready-to-eat food had the largest monthly increase in more than a decade, up 1.4% in April 2022, compared to the previous month.

This was mainly due to higher prices for dine-in lunches, burgers and coffee, Statistics NZ consumer prices manager, Katrina Dewberry says in a statement.

Supermarket items have had the biggest impact on the upward price trend, due to increases in the cost of staples such as cheese, milk and eggs, says Dewberry. “Inflation of food prices has generally been increasing since a low of 0.5% in the year to March 2021.”

Walk into any supermarket and the prices for basic items can be eye-watering. A block of cheese for $16, a dozen eggs for $7, a block of butter for $7, a block of chocolate for $5, a packet of nappies for $15 and a whole chicken for $15.

Shoppers are feeling it. You might be buying the same items but they’re costing you a lot more. In 2019, a family of two adults and two children living in Hawke’s Bay spent on average $329 a week on groceries. The same trolley would now cost $367, according to the Reserve Bank’s inflation calculator.

On the frontline of food support

Christina McBeth describes herself as having a front row view of the community’s struggles. As co-founder of food rescue operation Nourished for Nil, each week she speaks to locals at their five depot locations, who tell her how essential the service is to them. “I’ve heard people saying the reason they’re eating is because they come to us,” she says.

McBeth and Louise Saurin started the organisation in 2017 and since then demand for their rescue food has soared. Covid-19 has had a significant impact, but it’s the past year where McBeth has seen the most dramatic increase in need. Typically during the colder months client numbers decrease, but this winter numbers have increased

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 21

“Every day the supermarkets are making more than $1 million in excess profits. The supermarkets’ profitability is twice what it should be. We need more competition to drive down prices and give New Zealanders a fairer price at the checkout.”

JON DUFFY, CONSUMER NZ CHIEF EXECUTIVE

Where to get help Salvation Army Food assistance, budgeting advice, clothing assistance and support.

• 56 Tait Drive, Napier - Ph 844 4941 • Corner Warren Street and Avenue Road, Hastings - Ph 876 5771.

Nourished for Nil Provides food parcels via referrals and rescue food to everyone.

• 1004 Karamu Rd, Hastings • 703 Kiwi St, Camberley, Hastings • 400 Swansea Rd, Flaxmere • 30 Cranby Cres, Napier - For more information go to nourishedfornil.org Budget First Financial mentoring and support.

• 111 Warren Street North, Hastings - Ph 878 0530 Citizens Advice Bureau Offer advice about citizen’s rights and how to access services.

• Bower St, Napier South - Ph 835 9664 • 12 Queen St East, Hastings - Ph 878 0525 Napier Family Centre Provide wellbeing services to families in need including budgeting, homebased support and playgroup.

• Corner Morris Spencer Avenue and Wycliffe Street, Napier - Ph 843 7280

22 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

to levels they would usually only see in the summer – up 15% for this time of year. In central Hastings and Maraenui there are often more than 200 people queuing for rescue food, and in Flaxmere, more than 300.

And the demographic has changed too. Once a service largely supporting the homeless and working poor, there’s been a noticeable jump in the number of pensioners and double income families, says McBeth.

“Something else that’s new is the number of new faces coming every time we’re open. That’s definitely changed.” Many tell her they wouldn’t have come before, but now they simply can’t do without some extra support, she says. “I suspect it’s gone from more of a top-up to ‘if we don’t have this, we’ll go hungry’,” says McBeth.

Taking the step of asking for help isn’t easy and is something people often grapple with for some time, before reaching out, she says.

The Napier and Hastings food banks recently merged with Nourished for Nil, so it now offers a dual service to

locals. In the mornings the organisation acts as a food bank, making and giving out food parcels to people referred from social agencies. Each parcel is a four-day supply for a family of four and includes staples such as cheese, rice, pasta, and vegetables.

In the afternoons, the Nourished for Nil depots provide a food rescue service, which is open to everyone.

This service is reliant on donations from a number of suppliers and funding, so doesn’t necessarily cover all of the pantry staples, but it is always “an amazing variety of food”, says McBeth. Careful planning and stockpiling food when they have an excess has ensured they never run out of food and have never had to turn anyone away empty-handed.

Comfort food and easy to make meals are particularly popular at this time of year and during times of struggle, says McBeth. “It’s your bread and bakery, any frozen meals like pizza, or pies are always incredibly popular, and meat.”

In the five years of operation to February this year, the organisation

reached a significant milestone – it has rescued and redistributed 2.5 million kilos of food back to the community.

Urgent change needed

Supermarket price freezes will have little impact on consumers’ wallets and don’t address underlying problems in the sector, say experts. Foodstuffs, the owner of New World and Pak ‘n Save supermarkets, announced it would be rolling back the prices of 110 of its most popular items to last year’s prices from May 16 to August 14. The announcement came after Countdown said it would freeze the prices of more than 600 essential items this winter.

Consumer NZ says high food prices, fuelled by little competition in a highly-concentrated supermarket industry, are unacceptable. The organisation has been campaigning for much-needed change and recently launched a petition calling for fairer prices at the checkout. Currently two suppliers – Foodstuffs and Woolworths NZ – dominate the market.

“Every day the supermarkets are making more than $1 million in excess profits. The supermarkets’ profitability is twice what it should be. We need more competition to drive down

prices and give New Zealanders a fairer price at the checkout,” says Consumer NZ chief executive Jon Duffy in a statement.

“We recognise that food prices are going up for a variety of reasons, from the pandemic, to inflation, to the impact of the war in Ukraine on wheat prices. We’re not disputing this, but excess profits on top of already high food prices are a slap in the face for households struggling to put food on the table,” he says.

A Government announcement in May has sent a clear message to supermarkets: the lack of competition must change or be prepared for more regulation. “The Government and New Zealanders have been very clear that the supermarket industry doesn’t work. It’s not competitive and shoppers aren’t getting a fair deal. The duopoly needs to change, and we are preparing the necessary legislation to do that,” says Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, David Clark.

The response comes as part of the Government’s reaction to the Commerce Commission’s market study into New Zealand supermarkets. The Commission made 14 recommendations including introducing

The future of our coastline Tukua mai ō whakaaro

a mandatory code of conduct and establishing an industry regulator. The Government has accepted 12 of the recommendations and is taking stronger action on the other two.

Emotional toll surging

The supermarket isn’t the only place people are feeling the strain.

Mortgages, rent and petrol have also gone up, leaving people squeezed from every direction. Budgeting and social support services are stretched to the limit, helping a growing number of clients who need support to make ends meet. Many of them have never needed help before.

At Napier Family Centre, the financial capability services team expect to see a huge spike in demand from locals for their services, who come from a range of socioeconomic groups, including working families. The upwards trend is similar to the one they experienced during the Global Financial Crisis and is likely to continue for a few years, due to the impact of Covid-19 and rising cost of living, says financial capability services manager, Debbie Mackintosh.

Staff are also receiving more KiwiSaver withdrawal and hardship

Who should take charge of adapting to coastal hazards caused by climate change?

Have your say

hbrc.govt.nz Submissions close on Sunday 31 July 2022

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 23

Napier family feels the squeeze Katie Bachman, her wife, Rochelle, and their young son have gone from being a comfortable double income family to often having nothing leftover each week. Covid-19 hit the family hard financially, and the rising cost of living has left them feeling the pinch even more in the past year.

While they are grateful their rent hasn’t gone up, increases in petrol and groceries have had the biggest impact on the Tamatea family, which Bachman describes as being in the “squeezed middle income bracket”. “The price of groceries has gone up pretty dramatically,” she says. “What we used to be able to do for $150, then became $200 which is now creeping into $240 for the same shop …

Where do you find that extra money?”

Both trained chefs, Bachman and her wife cook their meals from scratch and ensure their family is eating healthy, balanced meals, but it’s increasingly getting harder to buy the basics. The family’s weekly grocery shop is well planned out, they always buy the cheapest brands available and each item is carefully considered before being put in the trolley.

Last week, she and her wife had a “massive debate” at the supermarket about whether to get two blocks of butter, at $7 each. In the end,

withdrawal enquiries, and many clients are struggling with multiple split payment plans such as Afterpay, Oxipay, and Humm. The plans, which allow people to buy now and pay later, come with high interest rates and default fees if payments are not made on time, pushing them further into debt. In addition, high rental costs, along with increases in petrol, power, food and other basic living costs are leaving many “unable to make ends meet or relying more on overtime and other supplementary income,” says Mackintosh.

At Citizens Advice Bureau in Hastings, it’s the same story. There’s been a noticeable increase in people wanting budgeting and financial support due to rising living costs, says manager David Gerbault. “Food is always the primary one – people are always wanting to make sure their kids have a full belly,” he says. There are also concerns around rising interest rates, petrol and rent. Everyone is cutting back and looking for different ways to make ends meet, says Gerbault. The organisation provides a range of services to help people understand their rights and access the services they need.

24 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

they just bought one. Other basics are also out of reach. “When you look at a block of cheese and it’s approaching $20 a block, it’s like well, I guess we’re not going to have that cheese this time.” The price of grocery items often forces them to make decisions about whether to buy quantity over quality, says Bachman.

Bachman has been going to Nourished for Nil for the past five years, to support the rescue food operation and to take a little bit of financial pressure off her family. Bachman admits she’s luckier than lots of people impacted by increased living costs, but her family still needs to be careful about their spending, to ensure their money goes as far as possible. So many people are experiencing financial pressure that they’ve never had before and looks can be deceiving, says Bachman.

‘Overall people see someone who might be well-dressed, well-presented and think they’re not struggling … or somebody who’s college educated and well-spoken and thinks they don’t have anything to worry about. But then at the end of the week a lot of us who do fit that bill are definitely feeling the squeeze.”

“Financial hardship as a result of Covid-19 and the rising cost of living affects day-to-day family experiences, and has a serious toll on our community wellbeing.

Financial difficulties are damaging relationships, impacting domestic violence, affecting children, and mental health.”

DEBBIE MACKINTOSH, NAPIER FAMILY CENTRE

It’s not just the financial burden however, but the emotional impact on families, that’s a huge concern, says Mackintosh. “Financial hardship as a result of Covid-19 and the rising cost of living affects day-to-day family experiences, and has a serious toll on our community wellbeing,” she says. “Financial difficulties are damaging relationships, impacting domestic violence, affecting

children, and mental health.”

Sometimes there’s no way of getting out of debt, and insolvency is the only option. But when debt can be lifted from a family it has a huge positive impact on everyone, says Mackintosh.

“It feels like the sun is shining again; the mood changes and it uplifts everyone in the family.”

Data shows just how much the cost of living has ballooned in recent years, and nobody has escaped the impact.

Those on fixed incomes such as beneficiaries and superannuitants have been hardest hit, but across the board we are all feeling the sting. While many of us are trying to change spending behaviour to keep our heads above water, for many, there’s simply no fat to cut out.

The effects of rising living costs are likely to be long-term and far reaching – impacting the physical, emotional and mental wellbeing of our families and communities. Recent government action on supermarkets is a step in the right direction regarding food costs, but further work is needed, and fast. Paying for life’s basic necessities is a human right and urgent change is needed to alleviate some of the stress many people are currently feeling.

BAND20891-02

The Government is proposing big changes to the way your drinking water, wastewater and storm water services are delivered.

At the moment, these services – known as the three waters – are the responsibility of your local council.

The Government’s proposing to change that, so in future, those services would instead be managed by one of four multi-region entities, responsible for three waters across the country.

For you, that means your council would no longer be responsible for delivering your drinking water, or waste and storm water services.

Instead, they would be owned and delivered by a new entity responsible for three waters for an area that would include all of the

East Coast of the North Island, down to the top of the South Island, and the Chatham Islands.

These are the most far-reaching changes to happen in local government in a generation and they will affect not just you, but future generations to come.

Which is why now’s the time to make your voice heard, while Parliament is asking for public submissions and before decisions are made. Go to www.hb3waters.nz and have your say today.

Our future health Will health reforms deliver better health care?

With huge restructuring now underway, local HB health providers respond.

Story by Tess Redgrave Photos by Tom Allan

“I want to have the same chance as my Pākeha friends to watch my 11-year-old boy grow up and have kids – it’s not a big ask – yet because I am Māori, I am statistically likely to die seven and half years earlier.”

For Nathan Harrington CEO of Te Kupenga Hauora – Ahuriri, a kaupapa Māori-driven health and social service provider, this is the depressing and graphic reality behind the oftquoted example of health inequity in New Zealand.

“The figures don’t lie,” he says. “The current health system is not working.

There are poorer outcomes for Māori and Pacific and multiple reviews have shown us that Māori just don’t have the same access to health delivery and specialist services as non-Māori.”

In a newly-reformed health system, Harrington wants reassurance that if he gets sick and needs to be referred to a specialist like an oncologist, he will be at the same rate as his non-Māori friends. “That if I turn up at a GP, I will get the medicine I need at the same rate as my non-Māori friends – and won’t be given a lecture on lifestyle.”

Harrington (Rongomaiwahine, Ngāi Tamanuhiri and Rongowhakaata) has

26 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

worked for numerous Māori health providers, been employed in the Public Service and was involved in the early stages of the establishment of the Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency. He is one of numerous people I have spoken to as I have tried to get a sense what Labour’s Pae Ora, (Healthy Futures) bill might mean for Hawke’s Bay when it becomes law on 1 July.

Structural change

As BayBuzz readers open their new July/August magazine, District Health Boards (DHBs) with their elected members – those names we’re meant to tick on Local Body Election Voting Papers but often don’t because we don’t know who they are – will be gone!

Ironically it was a Labour Government in 2000 who set up DHBs replacing a National Government’s centralised Health Funding Agency and four Regional Health Authorities.

Now the dissolution of the 20 DHBs around New Zealand is the first step in a massive re-configuring and re-nationalising of our health system with a whopping $11.1 billion tagged in May 2022’s Budget for the health reforms over the next four years.

The reforms have come out of the 2018 Health and Disability review and are underpinned by two key findings: 1) that we need to tackle the persistent inequity in health outcomes for Māori and Pacific peoples, and 2) that the

DHB system has delivered unequal access to health services depending where you live in New Zealand.

“We need this shake up,” says Tukituki Labour MP Anna Lorck. “A new system will deliver better outcomes for all of us.”

The reforms will see a refreshed Ministry of Health (MoH ) continue to be the chief steward of our health system focusing on strategy, policy, regulation and monitoring, while two new entities Health NZ (HNZ) and a Māori Heath Authority (MHA) will forge a radical new direction in the way we provide services.

In an early online presentation to stakeholders, Margie Apa, CEO of the interim HNZ described the two new entities as being like a double-hulled waka, Te Tatou waka hourua, both heading for the same destination/vision Te Pae Tawhiti.

Keriana Brooking, former CEO of Hawke’s Bay DHB, puts it simply: “We’ll all be in the same boat. Neither will be able to move without the other.”

Health New Zealand replaces district health boards (clearing their combined nearly $1.8 billion in debt) and leads the functional operation of our newly-nationalised health system.

The Māori Health Authority is an independent entity with clear accountabilities to both Māori and Ministers.

It will work with Health New Zealand to commission and plan services,

“The figures don’t lie, the current health system is not working. There are poorer outcomes for Māori and Pacific and multiple reviews have shown us that Māori just don’t have the same access to health delivery and specialist services as non-Māori.”

NATHAN HARRINGTON CEO OF TE KUPENGA HAUORA

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 27

How the system fits together The Ministry of Health, as steward of the system and chief advisor to the Minister, continues to support the delivery of high-quality health services by developing the policy and laws needed.

The Māori Health Authority works with Health New Zealand to make sure health services work better for Māori, taking over some of the tasks previously managed by the Ministry of Health.

commission kaupapa Māori services and monitor the performance of the health system for Māori.

“There will be a Māori voice in all health decisions going forward,” says Brooking. “Just as there’ll be a clinical voice. A consumer voice. A business voice…”

The Māori voice in Hawke’s Bay will be mediated, as in other regions, by an Iwi-Māori Partnership Board, which BayBuzz understands is being established as we go to press with members having to apply and then be recruited to the Board. Its membership comprising iwi from around HB, including our largest, Ngāti Kahungunu, as well as postTreaty Iwi Settlement groups and others.

I tried to contact chief executive for Te Taiwhenua o Heretaunga, Waylyn Tahuri-Whaipakanga who I understood had been participating on the design work for our Iwi Māori Partnership Board. She didn’t respond to my requests for an interview.

However, Phillipa Blakey, chief executive officer of the Primary Health Organisation, Health Hawke’s Bay, told me the Partnership Board would be across all health services in Hawke’s Bay and would connect into ‘Localities’.

Local priorities

Localities are a core part of the reforms. Eventually all New Zealanders will be assigned to geographical localities. In HB these will echo our current physical divisions: Wairoa northern

28 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Health New Zealand runs health services across New Zealand, coordinating efforts across the country by planning at a national level, delivering regionally and tailoring services locally.

MOH HNZ

MHA

HB; Ahuriri Napier, Heretaunga Hastings, Central Hawke’s Bay. Within their Localities, the new IwiMāori Partnership Boards, service providers, health and wellbeing agencies will all work together to determine the priorities and the roll out of services for their community. For example, one Locality might have a need for more diabetes support – and it will be up to local partnerships to agree on whether dedicated services are commissioned.

Another Locality may want to focus on more support for the elderly, and/or for its cancer patients.

Care and support in a Locality will be joined up across different health and wellbeing providers. For example, someone’s GP, local pharmacist and in-home nurse will work together to provide the wraparound care and support that person needs.

There are three strong features of the reform that come from a community perspective, says Brooking.

“Establishing the Localities and how they work; the introduction of the Māori/Iwi Partnership Board and how they contribute around decision making to what is purchased, planned and delivered; and the role of the consumer.”

She says front-line staff [nurses, doctors, psychologists, carers] will get more involvement in decision-making within their Locality. “But they’ll have to share it with consumers, community groups and the Iwi-Māori Partnership Board.”

Localities are still being established and won’t be fully rolled out across

Health New Zealand and the Māori Health Authority work closely with a broad range of communities, interest groups and providers. They will make sure the right changes that have the biggest positive impact are made first.

New Zealand until mid-2024 but in April this year Wairoa was chosen as one of nine pilot Localities around the country to come up with a Locality Network Prototype. This offers some clues as to how Localities might function across Hawke’s Bay. Wairoa has created a working group of iwi, government and service providers including members of Tātau Tātau o Te Wairoa (the Treaty Settlement Group), members of Whānau Ora, Wairoa Taiwhenua and the former DHB to deliberate on how the community of 9,000 pop wants to run its future health services.

Wairoa Council CEO and chairperson of the working group, Kitea Tipuna says access to health services has been an ongoing problem for the area and is now their prime focus. “We will be asking how do our communities access services and be self-determining?

What does that look like? And what might this look like for our different groups such as kaumātua, tamariki; those with long term health conditions and our rural communities including Nūhaka, Māhia and Mōrere as well as for our online services.”

Some of the potential gains for all New Zealanders from the reforms should be apparent fairly quickly, says Brooking. She offers the example of someone awaiting a hospital procedure.

“If I was in Northern HB and couldn’t get my cancer treatment done in Wairoa, I would go to Palmerston North as has traditionally happened or,

now there is no reason why I couldn’t go to Gisborne, where I might have good whānau support. Or if Gisborne people usually go to Waikato for hospital services, they might choose to come here to Hawke’s Bay instead. So, some of the boundaries constructed through the DHB legislation will get removed.”

MP Lorck says she has people coming to her office all the time complaining that they can’t get a hip or knee replacement. “These reforms are for those people too. In time, because we are no longer restricted by our boundaries and DHBs competing against DHBs, if you need a new hip in HB and there is someone in Palmerston North who can do it, you’ll be able to get it,” Lorck says. “Also, if you are from HB but have an accident in Auckland your records will be in the national database.”

It has even been suggested by NZ Health interim CEO Margie Apa that over time health professionals might be the ones moving around. “If we’re really doing well, we might have teams of people who might fly out, for example, to Tairāwhiti to clear a list of cataracts.”

Other than the above, some of the main changes promised by the reforms include:

• a greater range of care and support available for people in their local communities, with more care provided outside of hospitals; • services such as general practice, well-child teams, pharmacists, dietitians, physiotherapists and hauora Māori providers working more closely together in their communities; • more options for whānau to access kaupapa Māori and other appropriate services; • better access to consistent and high-quality emergency and specialist healthcare, available to everyone, no matter where they live; • more virtual and digital services available to support the system, such as phone and video consultation; and, • more opportunity for NZers to get involved in designing health and wellbeing through participation in local planning and the opportunity to engage in national consumer forums.

Local reaction

But what do our Hawke’s Bay doctors and health providers think?

The reforms are aspirational, says Jon Eames, a former owner of Te Mata Peak Practice, now working part-time as a contract GP at Central Medical in

Marewa. “But the devil will be in the detail,” he cautions.

Eames is keen to see how well primary health care will be supported and resourced by Health NZ Regional Boards – also part of the reformed infrastructure. He is glad we are getting rid of the postcode lottery system that led to different treatment priorities in different DHBs. “But if we give everybody equal access to hips and knee replacements, for example, then what’s going to miss out?”

For David Rodgers, a GP at Tamatea Medical Centre, and Hawke’s Bay representative on the New Zealand Royal College of General Practitioners, the reforms all seem very high-level at this point.

“On the ground we have a massive GP recruitment crisis. In HB we’re currently 28 GPs short and far too many people don’t have a GP and will struggle to access all sorts of healthcare.

“We’re a depleted workforce,” Rodgers continues. “We limped through Covid and now there is a big wave of pathology that we need to deal with. We need help right now. We need a magic GP tree.”

He jokes, but the sense of urgency in his voice is evident.

BayBuzz Online 1. The Buzz e-newsletter 2. Expanded website: baybuzz.co.nz 3. BayBuzz digital magazine

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

63 z BayBuz ril 2022 March/Ap

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JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 29

“The intention is good and the focus on equity is absolutely right, but we know the execution is the hard bit. Is this just shifting chairs on the Titanic?

We don’t know yet and it’s going to take a long, long time to embed the changes.”

SHANE GORST, GENERAL MANAGER TŌTARA HEALTH

“It’s hard for people in high positions in the health system to understand what it takes to get GPs bedded into the community. It’s not like shifting a brain surgeon around from hospital to hospital; there’s a whole community the GP needs to relate to.”

Rodgers sees the Hawke’s Bay and wider New Zealand GP crisis as a failure of planning and funding. “Not enough GPs have been trained and there hasn’t been enough funding for core GP business. NZ-wide we are at about 74 GPs per 100,000 while Australia is at 100 GPs per 100,000 – and that is where we need to be.”

So Rodger’s greatest hope is that the new HNZ will make recruiting doctors at a national and international level a top priority. On balance he is in favour of the health reforms. “The new model will lead to far better community-led commissioning of health resources – and that is exciting.”

Shane Gorst, general manager of Tōtara Health, which has primary healthcare clinics in Hastings and Flaxmere, says the ideology of the reforms is good.

“The intention is good,” he says, “and the focus on equity is absolutely right, but we know the execution is

30 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

the hard bit. Is this just shifting chairs on the Titanic? We don’t know yet and it’s going to take a long, long time to embed the changes.”

He says it is discouraging to be on the front-line watching and at the same time having to do more with less. He points to the recent loss of the DHB contract for free GP visits for 14-17 year-olds. Tōtara Health has commited to self-fund the service anyway, in the same way it self-funds GP consults for women under 30.

If anything, Gorst’s prime concern is the current GP funding mechanism – ‘Capitation Payments’ – which allocates funding to GP practices based on a per person system. On average, when combined with the patient’s co-payment, that’s basic funding for about three and half doctor visits per person, per year. “The funding needs to be targeted where it is needed,” he says. “So for us how the reforms set up the new funding and support mechanism will be key.”

Tōtara Health was founded in Flaxmere almost 40 years ago and today it has 7,000 Māori patients and 2,000 Pacifica, and is the largest provider of primary health care to Māori and Pacifica in Hawke’s Bay. “Our Māori and Pacifica whānau

currently have choice and we hope it stays that way,” says Gorst. “Many of our whānau have been coming to us for generations.

“We are hopeful there will be improvements with the reforms and that the system will have at its core a ‘by Māori for Māori’ approach with organisations like ours wrapping around that, taking a ‘with Māori for Māori’ approach.

“We must find ways for Māori organisations and non-Māori organisations, private and public, to work together in authentic partnerships,” he adds. “And for them to be grounded in high trust relationships.”

Nathan Harrington says Te Kupenga Hauora hasn’t seen much detail on the reforms yet and is “adopting a wait and see approach”. But he hopes his organisation will be a voice within its ‘Locality’. He is aware there is some scepticism about the Māori Health Authority.

“But look at Māori Health providers and how we responded to Covid,” he says. “The way we’ve managed to engage with hard to reach-whānau by using whanaungatanga (relationships) and whakapapa (genealogy) in the community to get vaccination rates up.”

Covid has also forced providers to partner up with other providers “rather than being competitive and working in silos,” says Harrington. “For example, in Ahuriri, Te Kupenga Hauora and Māori providers, funders, Taiwhenua and iwi partnered up to get food out to whānau during the lockdown.

“I am hopeful and optimistic that this is the best way forward and that the most important voice in the new system will be whānau so that what is being delivered is meeting their needs.”

If anyone could steward Hawke’s Bay through the first bumpy phases of the health reforms it would surely be Keriana Brooking, our former DHB CEO. I sat down with her in mid-May as she told me she would be staying after 1 July and that all her staff would move over to employment with either HNZ or the new MHA. (View that interview online at: www.baybuzz.co.nz/dhbsceo-keriana-brooking-on-health-reforms/) But two weeks on, as BayBuzz was tight on deadline, I received an email from the DHB Communications team: “Keriana Brooking has now been seconded into Interim Health New Zealand as National Director Commissioning – this is a temporary role expected to last two months.

“Andrew Boyd is now Acting Chief Executive for HB DHB until 30 June,” I was told, “and from 1 July will be known as the interim District Director.

There will be no CEO roles in the districts or regions.”

Brooking was already in Wellington, I learnt, and Boyd is the former chief financial officer for Hawke’s Bay’s outgoing DHB. So things are changing fast, and we can expect more changes as the reforms roll out. We’re told even Health New Zealand (HNZ) and the Māori Health Authority (MHA) are only “placeholder” names and by July l these will have changed too as a visual identity and logo is revealed for the new entities.

During my interview with Brooking in mid-May, I had asked her what Hawke’s Bay might look like 10 years down the track if the health reforms bedded in properly.

“In all corners of Hawke’s Bay consumers will understand all the services that are available to them and how to access those,” she said. “Like other industries we will have real interaction on how services can be different and better. Not just because someone has sent us a complaint but because a good service industry has a person-centered voice.

“We will see quite a dramatic shift in the use of digital technology in our health system. Ten years ago, we couldn’t have imagined we’d be giving out pulse-oximeters during Covid. So, ten years from now there will be things we haven’t even thought about.

“The way our hospital looks and feels will be more conducive to people who need to use those services. In HB we will still have a marae and chapel, but we will be all over sustainability, using our footprint wisely.

“We are concerned about the lack of GPs and work is going on to fix that. We would like nurses pay equity to be settled, immigration to allow more nurses in and initiatives for more nurses to go through training and graduate.

“Above all,” Brooking stresses, “we will have a more streamlined health system.”

Watch this space.

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JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 31

IDEAS + OPINION PAUL PAYNTER

Centralisation?

Bah, humbug!

Urghh, I have Covid. My 9-year-old bounces down the hallway like the energizer bunny and I feel jealous irritation. It’s day 7 of nasty headaches, sore throats, fevers, aches and exhaustion.

This makes me grumpy, particularly the expectation that I should report it on a government website, so they can monitor me and perhaps send me patronising advice. But that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

There are very few things that I think should be run by central government, but a pandemic response is one of them. It feels invasive but the management of our national borders, limiting internal travel and large domestic events are reasonable pandemic measures.

Having said this, delegating local rules to the regions via their DHBs would have more sensible. The good folk of Hokitika spent many months wondering why the cafés were closed and they were all wearing masks. For 22 months up until January this year, the West Coast recorded no cases of Covid and as a reward should have been entitled to pop out for a flat white unencumbered.

A trend towards centralised government has been underway for many years. Two of the big-ticket centralisation initiatives this term are healthcare and Three Waters. Our DHB and local body control of drinking water, storm water and sewerage will shortly end.

However, centralisation of public services has a dodgy track record and for several obvious reasons.

Connection Powerful central government arose with the formation of nation states.

This was a fairly recent phenomenon, mostly occurring during the 19th century. For centuries before this ‘countries’ were really a series of city

32 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Centralisation may be more efficient and even occasionally more effective, but the rational argument fails to take into account how it makes us feel. states. I don’t fancy life back then, without decent heating, flush toilets and electricity, but Canadian historian Francis Dupuis-Déri makes the administration of French city states sound very appealing: “During the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, thousands of villages had an organized assembly where communal decisions were made. This ‘community of inhabitants’, which even had legal status, functioned for centuries by a process of self-management.”

“The hierarchical or aristocratic authorities did not interfere in the affairs of the community, which met to deliberate on political, communal, financial, judicial and parochial issues.”

Such systems worked because there is greater trust within a community and also greater accountability.

Everyone knew the local judge and had a fair idea of how he’d see things.

If a good deal of the community didn’t like the judge, I bet there was a way of appointing a new one.

I have the same feelings about the Havelock North gastro event a few years ago. As a victim, then and now, I liked being able to run into councillors in the street and talking directly to them about it. I was also reassured that the likes of Councillor Nixon wrote to the newspaper to share his horrendous experience. You can’t beat politicians with skin in the game.

This feeling of connection, trust and accountability is no trivial issue.

Magyar maven, Gabor Maté, suggests

that the increasing physical and mental sickness of society reflects stress borne of ‘uncertainty, lack of information and loss of control’.

This happens when decisions are made far away by people who don’t know you and vice versa. Your life feels greatly affected by powerful forces over which – you increasingly sense – you have no influence.

Such a situation creates stress, elevated levels of cortisol and adrenaline. These hormones have helpful short-term effects, but we were never designed to feel stress constantly.

When people feel this way constantly they are likely to seek solace in addictive activities that release positive hormones – drugs, alcohol, junk food, porn, online shopping, gaming or simply tiddling with some inane app on your phone.

The libertarian principle is that responsibility should be delegated to the lowest possible level. Each individual should have as much autonomy as possible. Where that doesn’t work the responsibility should fall to the next smallest group: the family, the community, the city, the region, the nation and potentially a group of nations.

Underlying this are two concepts.

Firstly, the ‘aged-care principle’ – never do something for a person that they can do themselves. Breaking this rule is infantilising and will ultimately make them dependant on help they may otherwise not need. Secondly, the further away from an individual the power structure gets, the less we trust it.

Centralisation may be more efficient and even occasionally more effective, but the rational argument fails to take into account how it makes us feel.

Society is not an industrial machine and centralisation too often fails to respect the human condition and our need for connection.

Transparency Centralised systems are nothing more than state monopolies. We’d be horrified over a supermarket or fuel monopoly because we’d always be suspicious that we weren’t getting the best deal or that, absent competition, the operator wasn’t very efficient.

A good example, telecommunications. Prior to deregulation in the 1980’s, they were run by the Post Office. I recall we tried to get a new phone line to a property just on the outskirts of Hastings and were told it would take six months. No one under 45 believes this.

It’s easy to love the ‘free’ healthcare system. It is full of wonderful people and saves peoples’ lives. But is it the best we can hope for in terms of customer service and cost efficiency?

Many who work in the sector are deeply unhappy. Without exaggeration, every nurse I know is looking to get a job at Kaweka health. They see it as driven by younger, more innovative people, paying a bit more and providing modern working conditions. The DHB is set to lose some of its best people.

By nature, centralised systems also centralise any error. If you can’t measure and compare systems it may be a very long time before a major error becomes apparent.

A recent report by the Education Hub revealed a ‘crisis in literacy’. I took this up with a local school principal. He replied, “No one in education is remotely surprised by this. Standards have been in decline for at least 20 years.”

The ministry has had the data but action has been very slow to emerge. The most disturbing comment from this report was that, “There is no system to ensure new advancements in knowledge on effective literacy practice get put into practice in the classroom.”

The real world understands the risk of this type of centralised error.

In IT they talk about a ‘Single Point of Failure’ (SPOF): ‘a risk posed by a flaw in the design, implementation or configuration’ of a system that could cause it to fail.

In such systems engineers built in redundancy and back-ups to avoid disaster. An obvious example is aeroplane design and now air travel is incredibly safe. Of course, it’s more immediate and obvious you’ve crashed a plane than it is that you’ve crashed the education system. It is curious that continuous improvement processes are not so present in people-centric systems.

Accountability If a system isn’t very transparent it can’t be very accountable. Central government works hard at not being accountable and is very reluctant to admit when it’s made a hash of things.

Hubris and denial are endemic in bureaucracies.

The most emphatic example of this is post-war Germany. It took a few short years to demonstrate that socialism made everyone poorer and citizens started to slip over the border from East to West Germany. Despite the obvious market signals, ideologically East German officials knew they were right and so they opted for the obvious solution – build a wall.

A more recent example comes from that most centralised of systems, central banking. The GFC housing bust and the current inflation reflect gross errors in monetary Tukituki MP Anna Lorck with Youth MP and former and fiscal policy, but you’ll never Karamu High School student Keelan Heesterman. hear anyone admit responsibility for them. The central banks simply claim they are doing about the same as similar countries.

Only in a world where you compare independent performance is it obvious where you’ve gone wrong and what you need to do.

You are standing proud for your peers and for the I’d suggest a governmental role that future ofappeal. our region. is far too humble to have much They should create an Youenvironment have started your year of leadership at a where decentralised systems can history be time in our where school life, your learning established; systems that tolerate a and how you keep connected with environment range of different approaches and teachers has certainly changed from when friends and encourage innovation. Government you began in Year 9. Who would have imagined that should develop a small ministry mask wearing would basically become part of the whose only job is to measure perforuniform, and yet as young people always do, you rise to mance and efficiency and to report the their findings. This way wechallenge, can actu- adapt and make the most of technology to also ally figure out what works andteach what us a thing or two! doesn’t and various sectors can spiral With five daughters who, like me have grown up and the effort upwards. gone to school here, I am forever learning more by Let’s have some council-controlled listening to the younger generation’s ideas for a better organisations, some private-pubworld, for Climate Change, for wellbeing. I know you Electorate office lic partnerships, some rapacious will keep making the most of every 06 8701 470opportunity ahead profiteers – I don’t care as long as we now and as you continue on your own journey for Karamu Chambers get good services at an efficient cost. lifetime success.

Keep flying high.

129 Queen St East Such an approach will allow for communities to tailor systems to fit their Hastings actual, varied needs. anna.lorck@parliament.govt.nz Until you point to a centralised To keep up to date government system that is a paragon Yourup local Tukituki sign forMP myfor e-news: of excellence, I’m afraid I won’t be Follow me on Facebook: lorcktalk@parliament.govt.nz supporting Health NZ, Three Wa/AnnaLorckMP ters or any move by Government to manage community services out of 06 870 1470 Wellington. anna.lorck@parliament.govt.nz

Congratulations to all our school leaders across Hawke’s Bay

Anna Lorck MP for Tukituki “I’m out meeting with local communities, please get in touch to organise a visit or book an appointment at my office.”

Anna Lorck

Paul Paynter is our resident iconoclast and cider maker. Sometimes he grows stuff at Yummyfruit.

Authorised by Anna Lorck MP, Parliament Buildings, Wellington

• BAYBUZZ • 33 Authorised by Anna Lorck MP, 129JULY/AUGUST Queen Street East,2022 Hastings

IDEAS + OPINION DOMINIC SALMON

Investing in scientifically literate kids

Hawke’s Bay branch manager Jenny Dee (left) shows 3R Group CE Adele Rose (right) and the 3R Group team the “A Load of Rubbish/He Putunga Para” kit. Photo: John Cowpland

It’s been, let’s say, a few years since I was in school, but one thing that hasn’t changed is the importance of science.

To be honest, I remember the subject being quite challenging at school, but it gave me a solid enough grounding to complete a Bachelor of Science at university and set me on the course I have taken in my working life. All these years later I have retained a fascination of nature and its amazing cycles.

At 3R, and in the broader sustainability sector, science is crucial to solving problems like waste, pollution, climate change and creating a more sustainable world with a circular economy. Even if you don’t go into a science-based career, having a good

34 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

According to Education Review Office, regarding science literacy, "Only 20 percent of year eight students are achieving at the level we would expect.” grounding in the subject equips you to think critically – something which is vital in the world of misinformation, disinformation and ‘fake-news’ we now live in.

Unfortunately, in New Zealand, the level of science literacy among new high school students is not what it should be. Reporting by the Education Review Office last year said, “Only 20 percent of year eight

students are achieving at the level we would expect.”

Happily, there are those working hard to help equip primary and intermediate school teachers so they can make learning science engaging, fun and easier.

The House of Science was founded nine years ago by former biochemist and secondary school science teacher of 15 years Chris Duggan with the aim of improving science literacy in children’s early school years. During her time as a teacher, she became increasingly concerned with the lack of science literacy among new high school students and decided to do something about it.

The organisation, which is now

run in 17 regions around the North Island (including Hawke’s Bay) and in Christchurch, creates comprehensive, bilingual teaching kits which schools can borrow for a fortnight at a time.

They are designed to make science fun and engaging for the children.

They also make teaching easier, with all the lesson planning and resources included, with input from experts such as Scion.

It was on a recent work visit to Scion that the huge potential of science for solving problems was reinforced to me. While I can’t talk about the specifics of the projects I was lucky enough to be shown by the Scion researchers, what I can say is they are truly inspiring and sometimes just plain mind-blowing. Science really can change the world for the better.

It’s a world which has become complex – far more complex than when I was in primary school. And, while science has undoubtedly been used to unwittingly create some of the challenges we face – environmental and social alike – it’s vital to solving them, and more.

The key is raising the next generations to have a solid grounding in science.

While science has undoubtedly been used to unwittingly create some of the challenges we face – environmental and social alike – it’s vital to solving them, and more.

I’ve never been a teacher, but I can imagine getting a classroom of children to engage with science in a way which will help them learn isn’t easy, which is why I was so impressed with the work House of Science is doing.

I’m personally really proud that 3R has gotten behind House of Science to sponsor the “A Load of Rubbish/ He Putunga Para” kit in Hawke’s Bay. The kit introduces children to the circular economy and the waste hierarchy, with some fun, hands on, real-world activities.

There are a variety of kits so children can learn about microbiology, recycling and resource management, basic chemistry, and water analysis among other topics. Some kits have a real-world application, such as identifying different types of recyclables, while others let the children make

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their own simple polymers. They are designed for curriculum levels 1-4, so teachers can go into different levels of depth and complexity depending on the level their pupils are at.

Sponsorship is vital to the success of the programme. As Hawke’s Bay branch manager Jenny Dee told me, getting schools interested isn’t the challenge but rather securing funding to create and service enough kits is. If your business would like to get involved, I encourage you to reach out to House of Science in Hawke’s Bay. www.houseofscience.nz/branch/ hawkes-bay We all want a better future for the planet, and the people and animals which live on it; I firmly believe science will help us get there. And, it’s the next generation of scientists who are going to be part of those solutions.

3R design, implement and manage product stewardship schemes for individual businesses or industry-wide groups. They also help businesses take a fresh look at their waste to first minimise and then recover what would otherwise be wasted.

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JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 35

IDEAS + OPINION CHARLES DAUGHERTY

Rewilding: Help nature self-heal A display entitled A Rewilding Britain Landscape emerged as the overall winner, Best in Show, at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show. The winning garden imagined a landscape in South West England that is rewilding following the reintroduction of beavers, a keystone species extinct in the UK for several hundred years.

Beavers are considered ecosystem engineers. Their dams and canals change the landscape dramatically, creating wetlands and meadows that in turn provide habitat for many other species of plants and animals.

The winning display features regenerating alders and willows, favourite beaver foods, framing a small stream with a beaver dam surrounded by flowering indigenous plants along the edge of the stream and in a small meadow. Human presence is visible in a small wooden hut and pathway, plus a stone wall.

Rewilding emerged in the 1990s as one type of ecological restoration.

Rewilding initiatives repair degraded natural environments, increase biodiversity, restore natural processes, and create self-sustaining ecosystems.

Rewilded landscapes enhance biodiversity and mitigate climate change.

They help nature heal.

Philosophically, rewilding initiatives differ from other types of ecological restoration by having no specific target outcome and by limiting human intervention. Initial management often requires re-setting baseline conditions. These could include removing sources of pollution or eradicating dominant invasive species such as rats, stoats, and possums as has now begun nationally with the Predator Free 2050 initiative.

Once the re-set is complete, the rewilded landscape is left to its own devices to re-establish natural processes and determine ecological outcomes.

36 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Rewilding can be undertaken on small parcels of land.

Hundreds of iwi- and community-led projects are underway, removing invasive mammals and replanting damaged local environments.

These environments can recover quickly following an ecosystem re-set.

Given the chance, nature heals itself.

Respecting nature’s intrinsic capacity for self-restoration is a matter of principle for proponents of this method.

The Chelsea victory for the Rewilding Britain display has proven controversial in the gardening community.

Gardening guru Monty Don slated the display, asking if it’s really a garden if beavers are the main focus. Don dislikes applying the term rewilding to a garden, calling the display “a polemic around beavers”.

The rewilding community, however, will love the concept of nature making its own argument for renewal. Go beavers!

Although the term was seldom used, ‘rewilding’ has been standard New Zealand conservation practice for more than a century. Beginning in the early 20th century, more than 100 islands have had invasive mammals eradicated, far more than any other country, according to AUT Emeritus Professor David Towns. These pest mammals became destructive ecosystem engineers, either by exterminating indigenous species by predation (rats, cats, possums) or by changing habitats by grazing and killing indigenous plants (goats, possums, rats).

Eradicating invasive mammal species re-sets island ecosystems, much like re-booting a computer. A few important species with limited mobility (tuatara, giant weta, poorly flighted bird species like hihi and saddleback) may need to be reintroduced, but many species re-colonise on their own. Birds like kereru from the mainland or nearby islands carry seeds that re-populate the native flora.

The Mercury Islands off the Coromandel coast exemplify successful rewilding. All seven islands had been invaded by kiore, and cats and ship rats had colonised the largest, Ahuahu/Great Mercury Island (1872 ha). Rat eradications on the six smaller islands saved remnant populations of tuatara, lizards, and tusked weta in the 1990s, effectively re-setting the ecosystems on each island and allowing recovery to occur naturally.

Beginning in 2014, the Fay and Richwhite families who own Ahuahu worked in partnership with the Ngati Hei people and the Department of Conservation, including Professor Towns, to undertake invasive mammal eradications. These ecological re-sets have succeeded, and natural ecosystems are re-establishing.

Ahuahu is now open to the public as are other well-known rewilding islands such as Kapiti Island off the Wellington coast and Tiritiri Matangi Island near Auckland. Predator-free fenced mainland sanctuaries such as Maungatautari near Hamilton and Zealandia in Wellington demonstrate similar rewilding projects on the mainland.

Rewilding is scalable. Landscape scale rewilding initiatives are underway on all continents (see: https:// rewildingglobal.org) and across New Zealand. The challenges to mainland rewilding are enormous, substantially greater than on most islands. It’s hard to re-set the ecology of a whole

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Rewilding Britain at Chelsea Flower Show

country. Professor Bruce Clarkson of the University of Waikato recently summarised those obstacles and the prospects for reversing biodiversity decline in Aotearoa. In a future column, I’ll explore those further with respect to Hawke’s Bay. However great the challenges, though, the scalability of rewilding offers each of us a starting point.

Rewilding can be undertaken on small parcels of land. Hundreds of iwi- and community-led projects are underway, removing invasive mammals and replanting damaged local environments. These environments can recover quickly following an ecosystem re-set.

Individuals working alone can make a difference too. Excellent web resources, especially from Europe, describe how any renter or property owner can begin their own rewilding project (for example: https://www. tinyecohomelife.com/how-to-rewildyour-garden).

Beginning is simple – set aside a

small area of your property for rewilding. Even a few square metres are sufficient to create a wildlife corner.

Do nothing to it for a year and see what happens.

Other straightforward actions: plant a tree; create a compost heap; fill your garden with plants to attract bees and other pollinators; get ambitious and replace your lawn, reducing your use of fertilisers, pesticides and water.

Will such tiny steps make a difference? A few square metres or a single rewilded section may not, but 10,000 similar projects can. Why not do what you can to help nature heal? We can all be rewilders.

Charles Daugherty is Emeritus Professor of Ecology, Victoria University. He has been awarded an ONZM for his work on tuatara ecology and management. A former trustee of Zealandia, he now serves as chair of Biodiversity Hawke’s Bay and a director of Zero Invasive Predators (ZIP), but writes in his personal capacity.

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JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 37

OPENING FOR BUSINESS JULY 2022 Napier Port is the largest port in central New Zealand and the gateway for Hawke’s Bay and the lower North Island’s exportled economy.

In July Napier Port will complete a major investment in a new 350-metre wharf to service container and cruise vessels. ‘6 Wharf’ is a $190 million investment in the national supply chain and Napier Port’s own role in working to build a more efficient and resilient supply chain. The investment also represents a resounding committment to the future growth of Hawke’s Bay’s thriving region, its vital producers and the robust global demand for their premium primary products.

6 Wharf not only future-proofs Hawke’s Bay’s regional growth, it also opens up further growth opportunities and shipping options for cargo owners and customers across the central and lower North Island. The new wharf

will be long enough, and the new 13 metre berth pocket is deep enough, to handle the larger ships arriving in New Zealand in the future.

AHEAD OF TIME AND WITHIN BUDGET Napier Port turned the first soil on the wharf development project the same month Covid arrived in New Zealand and two years later it is on track to be completed ahead of time and within budget. Given the size and complexity of this infrastructure project, this achievement speaks volumes for the Napier Port 6 Wharf project team and the tremendous planning and hard work they have put in.

Napier Port see the 6 Wharf project as a case study for sensible, commercial port infrastructure investment. Based on a robust investment case that held

up to the scrutiny of a rigorous IPO process to enable its funding, 6 Wharf demonstrates that ports can deliver sound infrastructure investment, as well as success for a region and its ratepayers, for investors, and for local authorities facing increasing challenges around ageing infrastructure assets and competing priorities for capital investments.

SET TO IMMEDIATELY BENEFIT CUSTOMERS Once fully operational, Napier Port’s 6 Wharf is set to help alleviate ongoing shipping disruption and supply chain congestion across New Zealand.

Cargo owners, transport operators and shipping lines will all benefit from 24-hour berth availability across all the port’s wharves, improved operational

flexibility, and greater shipping capacity.

Specifically, the wharf is capable of berthing container vessels 320 metres long and a beam (width) of 50 metres and 360-metre Oasis-class liners – the world’s largest cruise ships.

A new state-of-the-art MoorMaster™ vacuum mooring system is set to deliver faster, safer and cleaner mooring capability. The automated vacuum pads are able to moor and release vessels in seconds, at the push of a button, with full remote-control access available out on the wharf using a tablet device. The system dramatically improves safety and operational efficiency, and also helps to reduce emissions during ship berthing due to reduced use of tugs and ship engines.

6 Wharf has also provided Napier Port with the opportunity to transform its terminal operations in order to maximise safety and efficiency

across the port’s own operations, with increased productivity in exchanges and crane rates.

SUSTAINABILITY AT ITS HEART Sustainability has been an overriding consideration throughout the 6 Wharf build, with detailed planning undertaken with mana whenua, fishing groups and other marine users during a comprehensive resource consent process. Napier Port has remained fully compliant with its consent conditions, in particular the water quality requirements at Pānia Reef.

Other significant sustainability milestones include: • Establishment of the Napier Port kororā (little blue penguin) sanctuary to protect this at-risk species found on port.

• Development and launch of the Marine Cultural Health Programme (MCHP) – a partnership between mana whenua hapū and Napier Port to monitor the health of the marine environment in and around the Ahuriri area.

• Creation of two new artificial reefs to enhance the existing habitat and health of the region’s marine life and provide for local recreational fishing. This project was a unique collaboration with LegaSea, a group of recreational fishers dedicated to rebuilding Hawke’s Bay fish stock, and supported by the Marine Cultural Health Programme Steering Komiti.

Learn more about the 6 Wharf project napierport.co.nz/6-wharf

napierport.co.nz

Napier Port

Napier Port

HAWKE’S BAY FUTURE FARMING TRUST Launched with seed funding from the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council, the Trust’s mission is “To promote, inspire and celebrate profitable farming systems that enrich the environment and the community.”

The Trust aims to expand Hawke’s Bay’s hands-on knowledge of best, restorative farming practices, focusing on innovation, science insights, new technologies and farming systems change.

As Trust Chair Liz Krawczyk puts it: “We are all about demonstrating and communicating leading edge practices here in Hawke’s Bay that will help our region’s primary producers achieve financial and environmental sustainability.”

We identify, publicly recognize and promote Hawke’s Bay best practices, practitioners and champions, and also promote non-Hawke’s Bay/New Zealand practices with potential upside relevance to our region.

So far The Trust has supported onfarm demonstrations, confirming, for example, the potential for building

40 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

soil carbon content and nutrient holding capacity. We’ve helped fund real-time water monitoring technology in the Mangaone Catchment. And we’ve sponsored workshops and field days to spread awareness of farming practices that both increase farm productivity and lessen adverse environmental footprints.

should Hawke’s Bay’s best performance look like in the future with respect to soil health, clean waters, food quality, animal welfare, efficient water and energy use, and profitability?

Our current trustees are: Liz Krawczyk, Phil Schofield, Scott Lawson, John van der Linden, Tim Aitken, Will Foley and Tom Belford.

The Trust aims to expand Hawke’s Bay’s hands-on knowledge of best, restorative farming practices, focusing on innovation, science insights, new technologies and farming systems change.

And watch for our announcement of a major project soon to be launched comparing conventional and ‘regenerative’ farming practices here in Hawke’s Bay. Over time we will document the superior performance by Hawke’s Bay’s farmers and growers across all farming sectors – pastoral, horticulture, viticulture.

Keystone Sponsors supporting our work are Bayleys Country, Napier Port and most recently added, Hastings District Council.

The question we ask is: What

We encourage you to sign up for our monthly e-newsletter to learn about leading edge farming practices in Hawke’s Bay. To learn more about HB Future Farming Trust, visit our website; www.hbfuturefarming.org or email us at info@hbfuturefarming.org

BayBuzz is pleased to support Hawke's Bay Future Farming Trust

Bay Biz Food producers truly drive our region’s economy. And then there are niches like ‘soft gold’.

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Hawke’s Bay harvest scorecard Our primary sector has faced labour shortages, drought and flood, pestilence and pandemic, supply chain and market access issues, and rising input costs. This most difficult of seasons has served up heaps of challenges. Here’s a cross-sector snapshot of the recent growing season.

Fruit

In mid-May, industry association New Zealand Apples and Pears (NZAPI) shaved 12% – or 2.9 million export boxes – off its crop forecast for the 2021-22 growing season, describing it as the most challenging in recent years.

In Hawke’s Bay crop forecast numbers were even worse, down 15%.

The east coast suffered from heavy rain in February and March; Gisborne had more than 530mm of rainfall during the season, and Hawke’s Bay 321mm. As a result Gisborne’s estimated crop is down 20% on pre-season predictions.

An earlier BayBuzz article on the labour shortage noted that through the pandemic New Zealand has only had around 10% of its usual 50,000-strong migrant worker labour force. The pip fruit sector’s labour woes are not new, and growers regularly have to choose which apple varieties to pick. In a recent media article Napier grower Kelvin Taylor said “he had to leave 15% to 20% of his apple crop on the trees this year, with not enough hands available to pick the fruit”.

42 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

NZAPI CEO Terry Meikle says a perfect storm of adverse weather events in key growing regions and major labour shortages during the heart of the harvest combined to result in growers not being able to maximise their crops. “It has been an incredibly difficult time for growers to manage their orchards, and the most challenging of harvests in recent years.”

Craig Betty, director operations for listed company T&G Global, says it’s looking to be a tough season.

“Weather was variable in our key apple growing regions, with Nelson and Otago’s favourable weather producing good sized apples with great colour, and the deluge of rain in the Hawke’s Bay proving challenging. As many global businesses will attest, Covid-19 continues to affect global supply chains, with a shortage of containers and shipping capacity, delays in some feeder ports, and varying levels of consumer demand due to lockdowns and Northern Hemisphere stock levels. On top of this, there’s workforce shortages.”

Betty says that T&G is working

incredibly hard to front-foot as many challenges as possible, including working closely with shipping partners, chartering six ships and collaborating with fellow horticultural exporters to co-ship produce to North America.

“While labour shortages continue to affect us, some of our seasonal team have moved between regions to help our orchards out, and office-based colleagues have also pitched in. Without a doubt, our industry is under considerable pressure this season. With the apples now off the trees, we’re absolutely focused on packing and shipping our premium apples to customers and consumers around the globe,” he says.

For blueberry grower Marian Hirst, partner in Bay Blue, the season has been one of the most difficult she has encountered, with yields down 10 to 15% and fruit quality affected.

“Poor weather conditions over blossom affected fruit quality and volume.

Some horticultural crops had blocks that were unable to be harvested. Fruit quality and decreased fruit size further impacted yields. Rain events over harvest resulted in some fruit splitting and

“The rain that fell in February and again in March, gave pastoral farmers a get out of jail card ... it was a real saviour for us.”

JIM GALLOWAY, FEDERATED FARMERS HAWKES BAY

“Despite this, we saw some new crop records set this season and we’re proud of our team and growers for pushing through these challenges.”

NEIL HEFFER, MANAGING DIRECTOR WATTIES

a negative impact on fruit pressure – our team worked very hard to maintain the best possible quality.”

Hirst is proud of her team, comprising long serving local employees, supported by very skilled RSE employees from Vanuatu, most of whom have been with her business for 8-12 years.

The challenges were many, she says. “Labour shortages were further impacted by Covid, with employees either sick, isolating, or recovering and at risk of long Covid. Market access was impacted, fruit quality was at risk due to shipping delays, and if fruit could get offshore international markets were unstable. On top of this, compliance and costs escalated. The level of red tape is a heavy load for everybody.”

Grape growers had a good spring and

44 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

summer, and everything was in place for a “special year” from a fruit quality perspective, says Peter Hurlstone, deputy chair of Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers, who spoke to BayBuzz alongside Ian Quinn, grower and director of Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers.

La Nina’s moist rainy conditions were expected, says Hurlstone. “Growers and wineries were well prepared by making sure canopies were nice and open, to give the fruit the best chance possible.”

“Early season growing conditions were good, that put us in a good position to get fruit off earlier. But damp and humid conditions later created more disease pressure. Ideally winegrowers like to control the water they put on, as opposed to what’s dealt to from the clouds. Hot and dry is good for us, and this year there was hot, but there was more wet weather through harvest window itself,” says Hurlstone.

There were concentrated periods (of fine weather) when we were trying to get different varieties of fruit off, says Quinn. “We had winemakers collaborating on hand picks. This was more pronounced this year with the labour pressures and (weather) windows available. And certainly around machine

harvesting, we organised machines to pick multiple winemaker’s wines.”

Predictions are that the Hawke’s Bay grape harvest will be close to average, with very good quality, says Hurlstone.

“Chardonnay, Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc, and Merlot harvests were good with some fantastic wines made out of vintage 2022.”

Labour has been an issue for some time, exacerbated by Covid. There is increasing competition for labour.

The wineries and growers have shown resilience and been very resourceful, says Hurlstone. “There’s been a lot more collaboration and sharing … working together to get everything in that we need to.”

Quinn says Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers did a lot of work last season, pulling together an accurate picture of what was required to run the sector this year, highlighting the (labour) gap and collaborating with NZ Winegrowers as it worked with other industry bodies across the primary sector to increase RSE numbers.

Trading conditions have been more challenging, says Hurlstone, “I think the positive is that there is very good demand for Hawke’s Bay wine and

“Labour shortages were further impacted

by Covid, with employees either sick, isolating, or recovering and at risk of long Covid.”

MARIAN HIRST, PARTNER BAY BLUE

New Zealand wine.

“For those people who are focussed primarily on-premise and the more niche outlets, business has been a lot harder. Cellar door sales have been impacted the past 18 months. It’s been tough for that part of the business,“ concludes Hurlstone.

Leading into the current season, growers had a good run with Quinn describing 2019-2021 as “dream vintages”. He noted Trinity Hill’s recent win for the top Chardonnay in the world, and some of the other successes for Hawke’s Bay wines in the past few years “should really help us to slightly buffer some of the difficulties.”

Meat & veggies

Federated Farmers Hawke’s Bay president Jim Galloway, says that the

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“Without a doubt, our industry is under considerable pressure this season.”

“Grape growers had a good spring and summer, and everything was in place for a special year.”

CRAIG BETTY, T&G GLOBAL

PETER HURLSTONE DEPUTY CHAIR, HAWKE’S BAY WINEGROWERS

growing season has been a mixed bag. The Hawke’s Bay chapter covers farmers located in Hastings District and Central Hawke’s Bay, and spans cropping, meat and wool, and dairy operations.

“Early season growing conditions were favourable with very good yields for processed vegetables, sweet corn, peas and beans,” says Galloway.

“But with the very dry January, peas shrivelled up and almost died. Staff shortages at the processors meant that not all crops could be taken, with some shipments being bypassed.”

Bypassing of shipments is common, Galloway says. For example if the pick sits too long before transport, it won’t meet quality standards. In those situations the waste is ploughed in, made into silage, or fed to stock.

“February’s wet weather upset beans quite badly. In some parts of some paddocks where it got wet, beans drowned, and yields reduced markedly.”

Galloway says that his patch got lucky: “lots of rain, but not too much.”

Further rain in March brought weather-related disease to beans. A lot of the cereal crop was harvested before February’s rain, and the crop was quite reasonable. Where harvest was delayed it got quite difficult with a drop in yield and quality.

Galloway says that most farmers produce a range of crops, and that diversity offers protection, compared to an apple orchard.

The labour shortages are having an impact, with farmers taking up the slack themselves. “Farmers aren’t currently working on their businesses, they’re working in them. They’re not doing the planning, the thinking, the big picture stuff. That’s gone down because they don’t have the time to do it. Combine that with isolating due to Covid and losing the normal outlets for contact with people; it’s been really hard for everyone,” says Galloway.

46 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

As for pastoral farmers, Galloway says that venison is doing far better than a year ago. “That took a massive dive because most venison was sold to the restaurant trade. They’ve had to pivot; selling to supermarkets and direct to consumer. It’s on the rebound.”

Lamb and beef prices have been very good. Lamb numbers are down following two years of drought, says Galloway. “Ewes were not in good condition going into the breeding season, and farmers had been dropping ewe numbers. The lambs were slow to get away (grow) in the spring due to the wet and cold, and the killing season started later, timed with peak Omicron.

“The rain that fell in February and again in March, gave Hawke’s Bay pastoral farmers a get out of jail card.

We had the feed, so it meant we could hold the animals. It was a real saviour for us.”

Labour shortages at the freezing works and shipping delays and unreliability have resulted in a loss of value for farmers, says Galloway; there’s more frozen product as opposed to higher value fresh, and less value-added cuts.

And while commodity prices are on the rise, and a weaker NZ dollar is helping, on-farm inflation is rampant.

“Prices look good, income looks good, but expenditure has gone up, so we haven’t got the profit that we might have got otherwise.”

Processing

Downstream of harvest hasn’t been easy either, with general staffing shortages and Covid disruptions all impacting. In January, food manufacturer Wattie’s was on a mission to recruit 150 people to support its annual harvest, and rival manufacturer McCains reportedly reduced daily shifts from three to two, due to labour shortages.

Later in the season, rain had a major impact on Wattie’s, says Neil Heffer managing director, Wattie’s. “Some of

Hawke’s Bay’s heaviest rainfall occurred during crop harvest. Not surprisingly, the rain caused major disruption creating wet and muddy conditions for most of the season as well as impacting some crop yields. This took its toll on both our people and machinery.

“Luckily, these events were well anticipated so we were prepared as much as we could be, but these challenges did impact what would have been an outstanding season across the board.

“Despite this, we saw some new crop records set this season and we’re proud of our team and growers for pushing through these challenges. We look forward to finishing the last of our harvesting in the next few weeks and taking everything we have learnt into next season,” concluded Heffer.

Napier Port’s half year result reflects the challenges faced by the primary sector, with the company noting that ongoing seasonal labour shortages and an escalation in global shipping disruptions have created challenges for all parts of the supply chain – customers, ports, shippers, carriers, and agents.

Digging deeper, half year trade volume data paints a sorry picture – down across the board – with apple and pear TEU (20 foot equivalent unit) down 40%, meat down 20%, wood pulp and timber down 12%, canned and other down 25%, other dry down 17%, compared to the prior year’s first half.

All told, the growing and harvest season 21-22 will go down as one of the toughest in recent memory. Grower resilience has been tested. 2022 has been about survival, making the best of it, working with others to share resources to get through, and dealing with Mother Nature.

The achievements of our primary sector are due to the guts and determination of our rural people. And while no-one can predict the future, let’s hope for all our sakes that the worst is behind them.

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Going green in volatile times More than just a badge of honour – the time to put your money where your mouth is has come, and companies who can’t do so will eventually be left behind.

Increasing scrutiny means organisations who have outlined an environmental and social investment framework in their governance documents will have to take those out of the drawer, dust them off, and start seriously thinking on how to move forward.

This is as true for financial institutions as it is other companies. Last year New Zealand made headlines by becoming the first country in the world to pass a law forcing financial institutions to disclose and act on climate-related matters. While not a silver bullet solution, this should in theory make it easier to judge the authenticity of ethical, sustainable and governance (ESG) claims by financial institutions.

We should see the formal exposure draft of the entire climate-related disclosure framework in July with the reporting commencing in December.

Watch this space.

Although environmental concerns don’t hold the same sway in the polls while people are facing a cost of living crisis, New Zealanders have generally seemed happy to move the needle towards greener objectives when feasible. For example, the number of EVs has increased from just 1,220 registered in 2016 to 38,117 registered as at March 2022.

We can see similar trends with ethical and sustainable investment.

Some of this will be a slow drift as younger generations raised alongside the increasing consequences of global warming become a larger part

48 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

A 2022 report from Consumer NZ places Gen Z participants as the most likely to expect their money to be invested responsibly or ethically with 78% in agreement, and Baby Boomers as the least at 69%.

of the work force and investor pool. A 2022 report from Consumer NZ places Gen Z participants as the most likely to expect their money to be invested responsibly or ethically with 78% in agreement, and Baby Boomers as the least at 69%.

For your everyday punter, investing ‘green’ might not feel like such a great decision when money they feel control over is at stake – what’s actually visible in their take home pay, rather than KiwiSaver getting put away for a distant day. Especially now, when the dollar amount in the kitty for discretionary spending might be smaller than in the recent past.

It can feel counter-intuitive to ignore lists of top stocks and instead invest for your personal values, goals and timeframe. It may also feel like you’re giving up control over your money by doing this – that you’re going to be better off picking previously big winners like Meta (Facebook) or Alphabet (Google).

Evidence shows us that crowdsourced thinking like this is not your friend.

Take FAANG stocks for example (referring to giants Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google). Four of the five stocks lagged the broad US market throughout the start of 2022 with Amazon, Facebook (now known as Meta), and Netflix suffering big-time losses. The group collectively underperformed the Russell 3000 Index by nine percentage points.

This came on the heels of a stellar decade—the FAANGs returned 28.02% per year from 2012 to 2021.

This year’s reversal is a reminder that investors should be cautious when assuming past returns will continue in the future. Of the five FAANG stocks, three have given up all their Covid returns and now languish back where they were in 2019. For Netflix in particular it’s a case of Back to the Future – prior to this year, the streaming giant hadn’t seen lowclosing values like this since late 2017 after years of exceeding performance expectations. As of publishing, the closing price was US $195.19, which is a far cry from the giddy height of $691.69 at November 2021.

So why might ESG funds not get as much press as these trendy investments?

Well, firstly, most of the big companies don’t tend to make ESG-esque changes unless they must … and many if them aren’t at that point yet. In 2020 it was revealed that Apple knowingly used a supplier reliant on child labour, taking three years to cut ties after learning of the practice. Similarly, they refused to cut ties with Biel Crystal (one of two suppliers who make their glass screens) after it became known the company was deliberately disregarding

workplace safety for profit – because it would leave Apple with less leverage over the other supplier.

Of course, other companies are doing the same. Shell made headlines just recently when a senior consultant sent a resignation company-wide, citing discrepancies in Shell’s stated environmental commitments and their plans for future new oil extractions.

Placing profit over people is, unfortunately, not a new phenomenon.

I’m not saying don’t buy gas or don’t use an iPhone, but if you’re trying to be a more conscientious investor, you won’t see many ESG options among the kinds of lists FAANG or other popular stocks will grace.

Secondly – headlines don’t get made by things going to plan. The reason we hear about FAANG, cryptocurrency and the like so often is because of their volatility. They’re relatively new.

They’re exciting. They feel like something that might break the mold.

ESG investments historically perform the same or better than their old school counterparts. So, while Bitcoin is typically in the news for soaring or crashing (more the latter as of late), a balanced and diverse ESG portfolio can be putting in quiet mahi for your long-term goals.

There’s a great quote from Paul Samuelson, Nobel prize-winning economist, that I’ve always found quite apt: “Investing should be like watching paint dry or watching grass grow. If you want excitement, take $800 and go to Las Vegas.”

Because the legislation around climate-related disclosure is young and not universal by any means, here are some things to watch out for if considering a values-based shift: 1. Disclosure – Disclosure and transparency are key parts to all of this. You want to be able to see what kinds of things your investment is funding, and crucially what it will not fund.

If you can’t get a clear answer either way... that’s an answer in itself.

2. Research & Analysis – While past performance shouldn’t be relied upon for future success, there should be metrics available to indicate whether the assets have been stress-tested and the rationale behind expectations for the future.

3. Diversity – As always, a diverse portfolio is your friend. Investing is a tool to help future-proof your finances, and as such your portfolio should hold a variety of assets to help weather future volatility. Choosing

ethical and sustainable investment options should not change this.

All this to say… if you’re looking to align your investment values with your personal values and move towards more ethical funds, there’s little evidence to suggest you would be worse off for doing so. Even in times where volatility is more apparent, like now.

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. This article was created in conjunction with Mancell Financial Group.

Simply Sustainable™ A science-based approach by STEWART GROUP for sustainable and ethically-minded investors Choosing sustainable options can be more than your preferences at the supermarket.

We can help you find the best investment strategy for your requirements and values.

Call us today for a free, no-obligation chat about what sustainable investment might look like for your situation and goals.

SCAN FOR MORE

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 49

BayBiz Innovators

/ FI O N A FR AS E R

Soft gold She set out to give New Zealand women the opportunity to wear the very highest quality cashmere in the world, without having to travel abroad to find it. And that’s exactly what Jo Lloyd has done – all from her Hawke’s Bay base. The entrepreneur, who started her business in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, explains her motivation – and how she fell in love with the luxury yarn dubbed ‘soft gold’.

“Have a feel!” offers Jo Lloyd, leaning over the table with one beautiful cashmere clad arm extended. “And look – I don’t say that to just anybody…”

Jo is the founder and owner of Modern Love Cashmere – a digital-first, ethical, and traceable cashmere garment business run out of her renovated villa in Napier South.

The super soft jumpers, capes, cardigans, scarves and socks are of the highest quality available to consumers anywhere in the world. But don’t ask Jo what the latest knitwear trends are, because she refuses to concern herself with that. “The whole ethos of my brand is delivering outstanding design, so women can slowly build a collection piece by piece,” she explains. “The garments last practically forever, and never date.”

Deeply entrenched in the world of fashion from a young age, Jo says she’s always been committed to buying carefully, buying once, and extending a garment’s life with meticulous maintenance and gentle laundering. She describes her childhood spent growing up within the many small towns and communities dotted around the east of the North Island. “Gisborne, Hastings, Dannevirke…” she recounts, admitting none of them was exactly a hub of haute couture. “But I’d save my pocket money and spend it on magazines like Elle, Vogue, and feast my eyes on the wonderful design of Prada and Dior.

50 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

“It was a time when all my friends were wearing those disgusting canvas kung fu shoes,” she continues, “but I just wasn’t interested. I didn’t want to be the same as everybody else. I had rainbow coloured ballet slippers. I think people thought I was a bit rebellious, but I saw that as a really good thing, and I decided to nurture that curiosity for fashion and see where it went.”

Jo left Hawke’s Bay bound for Wellington, gaining a degree in marketing, amassing enough in the savings account from her first job to head to London. Clothes were still a passion, but she was selective. “I remember buying a beautiful black blazer, and a stretch pencil skirt that I still own today,” she says. “My priority was to travel – to see the world and have adventures.”

Taking marketing roles in luxury resorts across the globe – including in Hong Kong and the Maldives – put Jo smack bang in the middle of the sort of clientele she would eventually cater to with Modern Love Cashmere.

“Worldly, often privileged, and particular!” she says. “I met really interesting people but equally, some of the immensely wealthy could be absolutely awful to deal with.”

Back in New Zealand in the late 1990s, Jo took roles as the Australasian marketing manager for Qantas and as director of marketing for Harrisons, but the idea of working for herself and

starting something new was always fermenting in her mind. “I left my last role, moved to Hawke’s Bay with my partner to be closer to family and friends, and really took the foot off the pedal to allow myself to think, and dream,” says Jo. “I knew personally, and was hearing anecdotally, that there was a gap in the market for cashmere.”

Jo already had her own curated collection of cashmere, each piece lovingly selected and purchased overseas.

“My very first experience of cashmere was a pink sweater I found in New York when I was 23 – bought from a vintage boutique in Soho. Honestly, I felt like a supermodel when I wore it!” she says.

“It had a real impact on me.”

But she says, she couldn’t get the same quality, softness and design aesthetic in New Zealand she was accessing abroad. It was time to do some research.

“I’d never been involved in manufacturing or importing,” says Jo. “So to begin with, I started to explore those avenues, really asking myself, ‘Is this something I can do?’ I needed to be sure I could source the cashmere yarn, and have the garments I wanted created, before I determined if there would in fact be a market for them.”

The quality of the yarn was “paramount”, says Jo, “and it was obvious to me that it had to come from inner Mongolia.” So, with the help of a friend in Shanghai, Jo began searching for a

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52 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

supplier who could fit her strict criteria and deliver her ethical, sustainable, traceable cashmere “right down to knowing which farm, and which goat it came from.”

Indeed, each goat has its own code, so batches of yarn are able to be followed back to the farm. And farming practices are also a priority. “That means better grassland management and controlling the number of goats being farmed.”

Manufacturing was her next challenge. “You can’t manufacture cashmere in New Zealand – it’s not possible,” Jo explains. “Even if there was someone doing it, the cost would be exorbitantly expensive, and nobody is going to pay $3,000 for a cashmere jumper! It took me a while, but eventually, I found the right manufacturer in China – a boutique firm that didn’t demand I order 500 of every piece in every colour, and somewhere that could knit my designs, with all the detail I required. I needed true craftsmanship.”

Finally, she engaged research company Colmar Brunton to establish whether the stylish women of New Zealand – and around the world – would wear her cashmere. Jo was determined not to fall into the trap countless others had – where a wannabe business owner’s confirmation bias gives them a false sense of security that their idea will fly.

“Cashmere is an expensive start-up – you buy the yarn by the gram!” says Jo with a laugh. “Yes, it was pricey to involve a third-party insights business. But the expense of investing in a website and buying the stock and kicking off the marketing, only to have the venture fail, would have been far greater.”

After working hard behind the scenes for a year, and using up a large chunk of savings, Jo debuted Modern Love Cashmere just ahead of winter 2021, and right in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic. Others might have baulked, but Jo was unflinching in her view that there would still be an appetite for cashmere. “It was actually quite timely – more and more people were shopping online, and mine is a digital brand,” she tells. “Also, people love to be cosy when they’re at home, so I made sure that alongside the more highly designed items, I also made comfortable, soft cashmere sweaters and pants for lounging in.”

Of course, Jo’s marketing background has been a great help when it comes to shooting campaigns, writing

copy, working with photographers, and choosing models. “I have a strong sense of what I want, and who I like to work with.”

But there are challenges, and they are many, as with any business. “My raw costs have gone up exponentially,” Jo admits, “and I’m able to absorb them for now. Just. But that will change.”

Sometimes she can’t get the exact colour she wants. “For instance, all the greys my manufacturer could supply were too dark and too harsh against the skin. So I had them create a soft, bespoke grey for my pieces, which was a big investment. But I love the shade, my customers love it, and it’s completely unique to Modern Love Cashmere – mine and mine alone.”

An at-home business works for now, says Jo, with warehousing facilities offsite to house stock. She’s sometimes asked about the possibility of a bricks and mortar retail store but that isn’t on the cards at this stage. “I’ve set myself strict KPIs, and I adhere to the stringent business plan I set myself at the very beginning of my journey.”

At each fork in the road, Jo says she is able to refer back to her original goal – of being a 100% self-sustaining business that never compromises on quality. And so far, it’s working.

Her special garments – ranging in price from under $100 (socks and scarves) to over $600 (intricate textured cape) are coveted by women near and far. There are loose plans afoot to expand the range – perhaps into babywear, or a handful of men’s styles – but Jo’s in no rush. After many heady years in the corporate world, the slower pace of life, and the flexibility of having her own business, is suiting her well. “I love to sleep in,” she says with a smile.

“It’s still a thrill not to have to be awake at dawn’s crack each day! But I do tend to work almost every day.”

“The main thing for me is to maintain the lovely balance I’ve found between doing what I love and making a business work,” she decides. “And for me, that means great business partners and suppliers and very few employees.

And having time to travel, go to Pilates twice a week, live life, be with friends.

Things that are meaningful to me.” modernlovecashmere.co.nz Fiona Fraser is the director of Contentment PR & Communications.

Nominate a savvy entrepreneur to feature in an upcoming column by contacting fiona@contentment.co.nz

Pre-planning the Gift of Love To honour. To remember. To heal.

Over the years that we have been working with families, we have seen how helpful pre-planning and arrangement can be for everyone involved. We think of preplanning as a gift of love for families because it means you are helping them fulfil your wishes at a time when they are feeling the immediacy of your passing.

Our new website is now online to help you prepare information ahead of time which means they know you will be happy with what they arrange for you, and you will have made a huge difference to how they are able to cope at this time.

It helps your family Next to making a will, planning your funeral is one of the most caring things you can do

You decide Planning lets you take time to consider the exact type of gathering you would like

It’s easy You can fill out our Online form or meet with a member of our family care team at your place or ours

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THE ART OF CRAFT -N ot oNly bright aNd bold but pure aNd perfect

Of the countless design movements that have influenced the way we live – the Arts and Crafts era was one of the most significant. About 150 years ago in a reaction to the craze for technology it emerged like a brilliantly coloured butterfly from its drab chrysalis to adorn our walls – our floors – our ceilings and much of the space between. Its emphasis on comfort, colour, clutter even, stood for traditional artisanship – a rebellion against mass production. Advocating economic and social reform, it was anti-industrial in its orientation Arts and Crafts actually represented two strongly opposed principles of interior design – purity in line and form bonded by a glorification of the elaborate.

The lavishness of medieval, romantic, and folk styles of decoration were gathered, garnishing every surface both horizontal and vertical then amid the air encased by such abundance stood intricately carved furniture and ornamental flamboyance.

A guest suite filled with House of Hackney Hollyhocks fabric and wallpaper.

William Morris – the English poet and artist who believed industrial production was taking away creativity and skill in design – epitomised the movement with his influential company Morris, Marshall, Faulkner, and Co offering everything the 19th century homeowner needed from wallpaper to furnishings, stained glass to carpeting. His designs many reworked in a contemporary colour palette - are as sought after today as then.

Lavish, lovely, bold, and beautiful.

House of Hackney, (founded in 2010) a more recent follower of the movement takes much of its inspiration from the William Morris approach – beautiful and useful. With wit and whimsy, their nostalgic painterly prints and bold jewel shades evoke images of Victorian salons exuding an offbeat opulence. Even with their latest astrologically influenced wallpapers, the pulse of their philosophy equates with the heartbeat of Arts and Crafts.

Cosy, comfortable, yet completely contemporary. And certainly not for wallflowers.

House of Hackney featuring Morris & Co Artemis velvet fabric in petrol and Golden Lily wallpaper in ecru and midnight.

Little & Fox Curtains • Upholstery • Interior Design

Design Store 60 Bridge Street, Ahuriri, Napier Concept Store 2 Joll Road, Havelock North www.littleandfox.co.nz 06 834 1368 | info@littleandfox.co.nz

Culture & Lifestyle Given the global status quo – many of us are searching for solace. The things we can control whilst providing comfort.

Think DIY, homemaking, reading, favourite foods, nature therapy, good TV and of course creating art. They’re all in this issue – with a guarantee to gladden your heart.

Photo: Florence Charvin

ABOVE: In this beautifully restored William Rush Arts & Crafts home both KA and her treasures have found home.

Hastings District Council is proud to sponsor BayBuzz culture and lifestyle coverage.

THIS PAGE: The living room is filled with mementos and memories – furniture and framed wall hangings – all of which have a story.

The ceiling and backing of the shelves (once a doorway) are fabric, lovingly dressed by KA.

M I C H A L M C KAY /

Culture

A place to call home Sixteen years ago, Katherine Halliday flew across the Tasman on an open-ended break from her birthplace, Australia. And fell in love with Aotearoa. Hawke’s Bay is now her home.

Story by Michal McKay Photos by Florence Charvin If you happen to be passing Greenwood Road on a therapy run to the Peak, you may come across a familiar figure outside a beautifully renovated Arts and Crafts house – sometimes with saw in hand over a slab of wood on a trestle table. Or maybe digging out what to the less particular eye looks like a perfectly planted border of hydrangeas. Always industrious. And definitely a perfectionist.

This is Katherine Halliday – better known to her friends as KA. The restoration is hers alone. Maybe a few helpers along the way, but pretty well single handedly she has refurbished what would have been classed by most as a ‘challenge’ and turned her somewhat tired home into a haven. Done with an acute eye – each detail in accordance with the laws of Arts and Crafts.

It is imaginative, original. And hers alone.

KA readily admits she loves a project. Never happier than faced with what may deter those of less stalwart character. In fact, the bigger the better.

Which is probably why for those on committees and boards in search of support and talent she is their first port of call. Examples? The Hawke’s Bay Foundation, The Arts Society, and most recently the Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival. And that’s not mentioning the multiple start-ups and other ventures to which she has contributed her well-earned knowledge and her skills.

The fact that KA is an Australian who has made Hawke’s Bay her home has to be noted. Her contribution to the Bay particularly in the world of arts has been and continues to be all-embracing. And reaps results. A force to be reckoned with. A force executed with intelligence and warmth.

Her hefty contribution comes from her corporate background which could be viewed as a blueprint on how to finally sit in the Chair. It certainly has equipped her to deal with high powered boards where skilled counselling is so necessary to be an effective member. Conversely, her upbringing has provided a prodigious practical ability particularly in the world of DIY– building, painting, maintenance, a seamstress par excellence, and a dab hand in the kitchen. A true renaissance woman.

In Sydney, like many, after finishing school she went to university – “But I had no idea really. We had nothing like the career guidance of now when schools provide a much better framework for understanding your skills.

I am a shocking procrastinator but give me a list and I get such satisfaction from ticking it off.” Which led her to depart Uni quickly for a stint in stockbroking before joining the renowned firm of Fay Richwhite in Oz, as a fledgling stockbroker. “I was their fourth employee; when I left five years later there were 140 staff.”

It also introduced her to corporate sponsorship – namely the Sydney Theatre Company – in which she found her milieu. Managing sponsorship, fundraising and education she mingled happily with the likes of Geoffrey Rush and “the hot young NIDA graduate Cate Blanchett. Economically I halved my salary, but I loved it – the annual cycle of performances and the importance of subscriptions. That was for about five or six years, after which I freelanced with a focus on fundraising for worthy causes.

“Then I got a call from the AOC (Australian Olympic Committee), which duly led me to Ernst & Young who were sponsoring the 2000 Olympics. They had

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 57

a sponsorship programme for about 1000 Australian Olympians – past, present and potential – which helped them secure jobs so they could continue with their sport and earn an income – or in the case of past – make a living; taught them values, skills, interests and also provided assessment through other Olympians.

“I realised what a difference such opportunities made to these athletes – something I would have loved to have done myself. But I also recognized that it had given me the skill to matchmake – establishing good sponsorship relationships. I became proficient at the ‘grip and grin’ technique – learned to work a room – it was the heyday of the ‘bovver barons’ and I swiftly became adept at just walking into a group cold.” With sterling results.

After the Sydney Olympics she joined Ernst & Young. And for six years oversaw their sponsorships including the awards for Entrepreneur of the Year.

“We had a $2 million budget which included national to international. It was the largest revenue plan for the company – two million to run but multiples of that in reward. It is select; you need to be invited and not everyone gets through.”

It also took her to some far away exotic places – Colorado Springs, Rio, Monte Carlo. And it was demanding work. “I have always been a good worker but for two years I was constantly on a plane – and I could not paper over the cracks it was causing.”

It was a crossroads. Her great friends Tim and Jules Nowell-Usticke had recently moved to New Zealand.

“They were the clincher.” She visited them regularly until in 2006 she took an open-ended break – “which after 16 years has been quite a prolonged one,” she comments dryly. “I got a tiny puppy and ended up six months later moving to Hawke’s Bay. I had had a career with the big benefit of well-paid jobs, the property market was always up – and I probably worked too much, but it did give me the luxury of knowing that now I do not have to and I do things for love, not money. But I am very conscious of how fortunate I am.” A generosity of spirit and kind is KA’s hallmark.

And this is when her fondness for projects came to the fore. Her first was helping Louise Stobart – of Birdwoods fame – establish the Sweetshop (a lucrative operation if ever there was one). “That is how we became friends,” and also how she became chair of the Birdwoods Board.

She did projects for WineWorks (Tim’s highly successful business) and met Aaron Hosford who was doing graphics for the wine company and Fe his wife, who introduced her to Bruno Chambers the former chair of Te Mata Park who in turn suggested she could help proofread a glossy they were producing for the park. “Well that was like pulling the thread of a hem. I had five years involvement.”

She also joined the Arts Society Committee and the Hawke’s Bay Foundation – “which is the most amazing vehicle for giving back to Hawke’s Bay and I love that my donations to the Foundation will go on giving forever.”

She was also a supporter of the HB Arts Festival from the beginning and is now heavily involved in the Patron programme with a goal to raise $100,000 this year.

Which brings us to the creative side of KA. “We had

58 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

ABOVE: KA and her precious friend Widget in the workshop – her latest DIY project. Shelving and cupboards were stored waiting for the restoration to their current glory.

OPPOSITE RIGHT: In the kitchen a map of the world offers instant dreams; the side table holds more treasures harbouring multiple memories including Jim Tiger – a hand puppet given by her father on turning 7.

FAR RIGHT: KA’s snuggery looks out to a newly built verandah and her stunning garden beyond. The perfect 5 o’clock resting spot. Note the wall cabinet filled with cotton reels.

a pretty frugal childhood – my parents were of that generation – and my mother was not only practical but also a fantastic enabler of interests. She would get you started on gardening, sewing, cooking, whatever took your attention at the time. I have also always had an affection for objects which have a story – a piece of lace, an old table, a toy” – which results in much reworking of precious pieces into even more precious pieces.

Her architectural treasure in Greenwood, designed

by William Rush in 1927, is testament to this skill.

But it was not what she originally had in mind.

“When I first arrived, I bought land on the Tukituki.”

It took two years to produce the grand plan. “Give me a spreadsheet any day and I am happy,” she adds as an aside. “Then the GFC (Great Financial Crisis) happened. And that lost a bucketful. So, I bought in St Hill Lane around 2008.” And did it up.

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JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 59

ABOVE: The antique cabinet and its surrounds house treasures gathered over the years (and hides an unwanted fireplace.) Widget and Mimi sit on superbly crafted chairs found on Trade Me and solicitously restored.

LEFT: The kitchen (where not one piece of particle board exists) is a warm gathering place , where flowers are a “must” as they welcome friends.

CLOCKWISE: xx

60 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

STILL AT THE TOP AS NUMBER ONE a Re

lty Limited

2

NUMBER

2 1/2 02

East er n

NUMBER ONE AGENT FOR BAYLEYS HAWKE’S BAY 2021/22

AGENT

B AY L E Y S

H AW K E ’ S B AY

During the 2021-2022 financial year, my team and I are delighted to have had the opportunity to assist our clients to sell and purchase 49 fabulous properties in Havelock North and surrounding areas, ranging from a $450,000 home to a $4,600,000 lifestyle property, at a total value of over $81 million.

This would not have been possible without the support of my valued clients, friends and family, and we look forward to working with you now and in the future.

M 021 988 904 E gretchen.paape@bayleys.co.nz EASTERN REALTY LTD, BAYLEYS, LICENSED UNDER THE REA ACT 2008

ALTOGETHER BETTER

Residential/ Commercial/ Rural/ Property Services

LEFT: Every piece in KA’s home tells a story – like the coin purses which belonged to her great grandmother on the wall, each carefully placed in perfect harmony.

BELOW: Outside, the garage is now newly restored with a workshop, following the style of the house architect William Rush. Note the perfectly selected paint shades. Nothing is done by chance.

Then she bought Greenwood.

“I had no idea what I was going to do with it then.”

To say it was rundown is an understatement.

“But I have lived with recycling, repossessed, and a paste it on mantra for much of my life, having dealt with our parents (she has siblings both still living in Sydney) where they lived for 60 years in the same house. I do not consider myself an artist but rather a creative collator. And I grew up in an era when things were fixed– Dad (a medical specialist by profession) also had a big workshop and we had ongoing discussions about screws, vices, nails. Clothes were mended. There were craft afternoons with my mother. That’s how I learnt to sew. And sand.

And paint.”

Her homes have seen two Hospice Holly Trails and she also did the decoration for Whare Ra in the most recent one. But she admits that her precious Arts and Crafts home has been a “rather monumental overall project. Which I have done bit by bit” – including creating a breathtakingly beautiful garden both front and back. She confesses to a tendency to “buy these beaten-up old objects and then spend 40 hours of sanding and painting, all the while thinking ‘What was I thinking!’ For instance, there is not a single piece of particle board in the kitchen.”

This year the final stage of this labour of love has been redoing the garage. Originally a very well-hidden building shrouded by ivy out front – it is now her workshop with car parking potential. Sympathetically reflecting the real Arts and Craft style.

Confessing to a inclination for “black hole moments”, KA has found such projects as her now almost finished home are “what get me up in the morning. Finding something every day that is worthwhile makes me happy. This physically beautiful environment and the community – particularly the one that is here at Greenwood – sustain me.”

As do the quality of her friendships – “which were an unknown entity when I started over in NZ. I doubt I would have developed such rewarding relationships if I had not put my shoulder to the wheel – giving time whether writing, designing, strategizing, even tidying sock drawers – I feel more seen and known by the friends I have made here. I don’t have to edit myself.”

Spoken by an Australian who has found her place to call home in Havelock North. In so doing KA has made Hawke’s Bay the richer for it.

62 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Te mutunga kē mai o te tiakitanga The new standard in surgical care

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Digestive system

Cervix

Nose

Testes

Ears

Ovaries

Throat

Eyes

Prostate

Thyroid

Gallbladder

Sinuses

Uterus

“Being part of a brand new facility offers a great opportunity to have capacity to help serve the people of Hawke’s Bay and provide procedures and operations to help improve the quality of life of our community.

It will be wonderful having fresh and modern facilities to match with the service we offer.”

Mr Bevan Jenkins, General Surgeon

www.kawekahospital.nz

I usually don’t plan it. I don’t know what will turn up.

I just let it flow.

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Culture Artists in residence

Dali Susanto

Dali Susanto

Art is alchemy — pigment and cloth elevated by thoughts and feelings to convey some sort of message.

Every finished piece has undergone a journey to reach its final form.

Inside the artist’s studio is where this magic happens.

Each process is unique.

Each place to create conveys something of the artist’s nature within its very walls.

Come peek behind the curtain of some of Hawke’s Bay’s most fascinating creatives and learn how they live and work.

Story by Rosheen FitzGerald Photos by Florence Charvin

Dali Susanto’s signature style is instantly recognisable and ubiquitous. Popping up on windows, pavements and streetscapes, on clothing, on people at parties, on cars and on anything that stays still long enough to be painted, Dali is a man on a mission, spreading his brand of quirky joy across the Bay and beyond. From creating on the fly in whatever space he could squeeze into, Dali found a place to work and play at Spaceship Studios.

Located in the heart of Hastings’ thriving cultural quarter, Dali shares space with a movable feast of creatives who contribute to the vibrant community with which he surrounds himself. Collaborative works from artists past and present adorn the walls in eye popping street style, matching the zesty vivacity with which Dali dresses, paints and lives.

The vintage dresser behind his desk is lined with rows of ordinary test pots, Dali’s preferred medium for canvasses and clothing alike. “I use test pots for everything – l lay it on real thick,” he gestures to the jumble of diverse works in progress piled high on the shelves.

His palette is the household colour card, bold hues suiting his block style.

He begins with abstract shapes, tonal shades laid adjacent. His composition and colour choice are instinctive, mirrored in his razor sharp eye for a striking op shop find. “I usually don’t plan it. I don’t know what will turn up. I just let it flow,” he says with a characteristic mischievous grin.

Once dry, he fills in form, overlaying in black with a bold hand. Stark contrast and decisive lines are the bones of his style. His subject matter is slightly bizarre and sometimes obtuse, but comes from his heart and the relationships he makes wherever he goes. “It’s kind of like writing a poem but I put it into a canvas. Probably only I know how to read it but hopefully someone will get what I’m trying to say behind my paintings,” he muses.

Dali is a people person, friendly with everyone. The urban studio suits his vibe perfectly, the regular footfall feeding his insatiable desire for sociability. “Every day I talk to people, and learn the stories behind them,” as he explains his inspiration for the messages that make their way into his work. He uses text particularly in public pieces, sending a beacon of positivity into the world, drawing people in.

Like the man, his work is dynamic, feeding into the community. Body painting has brought him to festivals around the country, turning ordinary people into extraordinary works of art.

His annual birthday celebration, Dali Day, celebrates the essence of the artist. When Covid prevented him visiting his Indonesian home, his many friends came together to cheer him up. What began as a hedonistic dress up party has evolved into a themed group exhibition. Last year people painted saws, this year op shops will be scoured for objects to upcycle. In keeping with the Dali ethos, anyone with the impetus to contribute is welcome. In Dali’s world, life is a great big joyful party and everyone is invited.

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 65

Joseph Rowntree Rowntree

On a lonely windswept peak, close to where the mountains sweep down to the sea, an eclectic collection of almost dwellings cling to the hillside. A rosy glow emits from the window of the old school two-tone turquoise house bus.

Chickens meander through vegetable beds. An ecstatic staffy wriggles with delight on the deck of the shipping container kitchen. Newly planted trees bravely battle the significant wind.

Here, in the smallest possible cabin capable of housing a man of his stature, Joseph Rowntree hones his craft.

He paints people not portraits, apart from the occasional commission. “I paint people as metaphors. I’m intrinsically fascinated by people but as an image to reference something else.

They’re not paintings of a particular person, they’re paintings of humanity, of my experience. Really, they’re paintings of me,” he explains.

Also known as JR the Free, Rowntree is invested in autonomy and authenticity in his practice and his product.

“I want to be really genuine with my art, not put a whole lot of afterthought onto it. I want to really think about what’s going in and why it’s going in,” he muses. He captures his subjects himself, moving through the world honing his lens on people in attitudes that speak to something he wants to express.

Back in the studio, his photographs become source material. He will paint with anything, but lately the legacy of oils has been calling him. “Oils are super technical. I’m finally getting to the point where I can play with them, I kind of know what they’re going to do, so I can experiment. They’ve got a richness to them acrylic doesn’t have.”

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Rowntree is an artist in evolution, constantly pushing himself to new things. He initially painted on windows, laying acrylic over glass, scratching away in relief with an experimentation of textures, layering them over the imagined landscapes of the mind.

Then, their temporality appealed, but now that his skill and style have grown into their own, he’s drawn to longevity.

“It’s for the paintings. I want them to mean something…It’s archival. I want my work to be around for two, three hundred years.”

The bleak solitude of his surrounds has seeped into his work. “It’s good for me to isolate myself a bit. I’m easily led astray. It keeps my thoughts clear. You know the ideas you’re having are your own as much as they can be,” he says.

Certainly, the paintings have a renewed simplicity – a paired back maturity.

“Negative space creates a kind of awkwardness I’m really into. Everything is so busy visually right now. I want to make paintings that are really paintings.

Where you can feel the paint. They’ve got just enough going on, the bare essentials there, as opposed to trying to wow someone with your intensity.”

His renewed connection to the land, putting down roots and investing in legacy, also bleeds into his paintings.

“I’ve never been a forward thinker but it’s good to plant trees and things like that. You’re being forced to forward think. And that’s made me think about my practice more. Do I want to make the same pretty thing over and over again and make money from it? Or do I want to make weird looking things that tear my heart out a little bit?” he asks.

Living on a shoestring in the middle of nowhere gives Rowntree the freedom to work on the kinds of pieces that speak to him. With low overheads, he is at liberty to mine the vaults of his heart and mind to produce work unadulterated by what the market might demand. His latest partnership with the newly opened Ākina Gallery should provide a fertile place for his paintings to speak his truth to those who care to listen.

I t’s good for me to isolate myself a bit. I’m easily led astray. It keeps my thoughts clear. You know the ideas you’re having are your own as much as they can be.

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 67

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“Pull quote” CREDIT

Kezia Whakamoe (Ngāi Tūhoe)

In a distant corner of Waiohiki Arts Village, past pottery and the communal courtyard, a cottage and shed flank a secluded plot of well-turned earth, shaded by an ancient and abundant plum tree. The shed’s only visible window is daubed with an unmistakably vulvic form, rough rendered as though by a muddy hand. Inside this dim-lit womb-like space a musk of earth and beeswax and the tiniest tinge of death linger.

Here, in the heartland of Ngāti Pārau, Kezia Whakamoe (Ngāi Tūhoe) births her works.

Whakamoe’s practice is intense and intentional, her process instinctive and ritual, in collaboration with the elements, the whenua and her personal atua, in communion with Papatūānuku and Ranginui. Raw and authentic, her subject matter is her own growth, the finished product an archive of her deep inner work. “My creation stems from going through transformation within myself. I have to be brutally honest. It always starts with wairua. It starts generations back,” reflects Whakamoe.

Quiet time spent in wild places allows her “space for conversation to happen within.” The surface noise of the world shut out, she searches for signs, observes birds – kōtare are often kaitiaki – and communes with atua. “Is this about a death process? A rising process?

Honouring the new day? Honouring our kuia and her knowledge? It’s about what atua can I align with, what can I learn about. It’s always a learning process,” she explains.

On these exploratory missions she gathers whenua, raw materials for her work. Her studio is thick with

taonga from forest and shore. Some are crafted into sculptural forms, an impressive rākau fashioned from petrified bark and bird wing. Others await grinding and mixing to create pigmentation with which she paints.

A canvas stretched across a long table is weighed at the corners with skulls. Recently retrieved from the river, its markings have been changed by the flowing water. Soon, when moon and stars reach optimum alignment, it will be buried in the grave-like plot outside her door, committed to the bosom of Papatūānuku, into the hands of Hine-nui-te-pō. “I bury them because that’s one thing we have in common, we’re all going to die. Hinenui-te-pō levels it for us. We’re all the same when we come to her, we’re dead. Then she shows you the next place, how to move your energy as it leaves the body.”

The story of Hine-nui-te-pō resonates for Whakamoe on many levels.

From her origins as guardian of dawn and dusk, she turned her back on the living to take dominion of the underworld. Māui violated her in a bid to attain immortality, but was crushed to death between her vaginal teeth creating the first menstruation.

Whakamoe is no stranger to men in power feeling entitled to women’s bodies as well as their unpaid labour, physical, emotional and spiritual. Her exhibition, Aukati – a complex word meaning both boundary and discrimination – documented her process of regaining sovereignty after sexual assault. In doing so, she calls out a culture where violation thrives and survivors are unsupported.

It’s a decolonisation process, focusing on reclaiming power rather than projecting shame and blame. “I’m not into cancel culture. Is the point healing or to cause more harm? It’s so easy to continue the anger and rage but I need to engage in my own transformation, my own sense of mana, my own sense

I’m not into cancel culture.

Is the point healing or to cause more harm? It’s so easy to continue the anger and rage but I need to engage in my own transformation, my own sense of mana, my own sense of sovereignty, of mana motuhake, in my life.

of sovereignty, of mana motuhake, in my life. If I’m busy giving energy to those who harmed me that’s outside the kaupapa…I’m reconnecting with my whakapapa through the mahi. I’m actively allowing grief to move as part of my reconnection to myself. Never mind you, rape culture. I have no time for you. Aukati was about creating my boundaries.”

While her canvases germinate under the earth, so does Whakamoe dig her own depths, “to really dredge what’s going on in my heart and be able to share.” Sketches, maps and spells bedeck her workspace, articulating her metamorphosis. When shifts in her person and the cosmos align, her work is unearthed amidst feasting and song.

“We’ll say the karakia, and raise them up, like birthing a baby. Then hang them out to dry and go through more and more processes until they’re done. I stitch them back together if they’ve got holes in them, rub them with homemade balm. It’s really like I’m doing that to myself, to anyone I can’t reach physically. Humans are hard to work with but it’s easy to work with this.”

Presenting her work to the world is a challenge Whakamoe consciously navigates, particularly when negotiating white-dominated artistic spaces.

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She cradles her work in dynamic installation, commanding gallery spaces to create full sensory experiences. Deliberately decolonising, she uses the tools of her whakapapa and spells of intention to draw us in to see, smell and feel facets of her experience through the lens of te ao Māori.

Reconnecting with her Tūhoe roots and casting her net wide to engage with others walking this path contribute to her continued process. She’s collaborated with collectives all over the country, creating wānanga and kōrero to actively dismantle an unjust system.

“The purpose is to whakamana us as Māori, particularly our non-male, genderfluid, takatāpui, ones who are constantly oppressed and traumatised just by leaving the house.”

Her upcoming exhibition at Ahuriri Contemporary, Hautaki, unites creatives from her latest group show, Hā, with elements of Autaki and new works, currently in the ground, channelling the catharsis of Matariki. It’s an exercise in group therapy, a gift that rolls and grows with each life it touches.

“How can I contribute to the raising and the healing of mana whenua and tangata whenua and of myself as well as everyone else?” ponders Whakamoe. “It was the collective that saved me. Isolation is the killer.”

For her, this mahi is more than a career, it is a vocation, a compulsion.

“I’m born to tell these stories. This is what I need to do in my life because as I tell those personal stories other people connect.”

(Artists in Residence is part of an ongoing occasional series featuring the abundance of talent to be found in Hawke’s Bay)

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A good read At last, hope for reluctant readers Story by Kay Bazzard Photos by Florence Charvin

Reading independently with enjoyment is a pivotal point in human development, but unfortunately for a number of young people, they never reach that stage. As many a teacher or parent can tell you, for some children learning to read can be a real challenge and often they arrive at high school unable to do so.

There are complex reasons for delays, but Hawke’s Bay teacher, Kerri Thompson is determined to address that too-common experience. She is the founder of #NZreadaloud and is achieving notable success with former reluctant readers from Years 1-10 in many classrooms around Aotearoa.

Not just reading aloud

#NZreadaloud is a literacy initiative with a simple goal … ‘One Book to Connect Kiwi Kids across Aotearoa’. The focus is on New Zealand authors writing stories in New Zealand settings. It is an interactive and integrated approach to literacy that inspires a love of story.

Kerri says, “My mission is to encourage and foster connected learning. I want to give Kiwi students the opportunity to connect, share and discuss learning by flattening the walls of our classrooms; to understand that they are a part of something far bigger than themselves. I want them to develop a love of books and reading and to show them the power of taking yourself out of reality through the story.”

Kerri has been a teacher for 26 years, including at Tamatea Intermediate, where typically, there’d be 5-6 reading groups working on different novels making it a complicated process for her and her students. The result? A limited critical engagement with the books.

While looking for fresh approaches, she stumbled across #Global Readaloud developed by a United States-based teacher, Pernille Ripp, who believes that a widely spread collaboration ‘shows students that they are part of something bigger than themselves’.

Kerri saw the initiative as a catalyst to developing a way of reading that is engaging, inclusive and shared. Not only celebrating our New Zealand writers but allowing students to read content to which they can connect – places they may have been, characters that reflect whanau, relatives, familiar settings and language true to our Kiwi culture. As a result learners become engaged and motivated. And discover a love of story.

Observing the classroom in action …

Sandra Howard reads the Term 2 book Spark Hunter giving a voice to each character. Written by Sonya Wilson it’s an epic Kiwi adventure-fantasy set in Fiordland, a tale of survival in one of the world’s last great wildernesses.

The Year 7 pupils sit at their tall desks, chin-on-hands listening and registering the ebb and flow of words, absorbed in the story. Sandra pauses on an unfamiliar word, asks its

“My mission is to encourage and foster connected learning.

I want to give Kiwi students the opportunity to connect, share and discuss learning by flattening the walls of our classrooms; to understand that they are a part of something far bigger than themselves. ” KERRI THOMPSON

meaning and suggestions are made.

Again, a pause – they unpick the meaning and context of a word in te reo Māori. It too is noted. They use sketchnoting skills to record the themes, meanings, sparks of curiosity inspire their own inquiry, children in the learning driver’s seat. It’s a dynamic and evolving learning environment.

Readers both reluctant and fluent, all benefit from this approach. If a student is struggling to read on their own, having a story read to them brings it to life, allowing connection with characters, settings and the plot.

When the reading ends they move around the classroom to find their chosen group and the different technologies are put to use – Twitter, Edmodo, Zoom, Flipgrid, Baamboozle. Through their desk tablets they share ideas with kids in schools elsewhere in Aotearoa.

Like the US model, #NZreadaloud is offered to schools at no cost. As its founder, Kerri works long hours

LEFT: Sandra Howard at Tamatea Intermediate JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 73

Mary-anne Scott reads aloud The #NZreadaloud book choice for Term 1 of 2022 was The Tomo written by local writer, Mary-anne Scott who specializes in place-centred New Zealand stories for the young teen target audience.

In this book Mary-anne vividly describes a remote location on the East Coast and the realities of farming life. The main protagonist is Phil, a likeable, kind and ordinary 15-year-old who experiences some testing and extraordinary circumstances. In this, her sixth book, the story is based on a true event from her own family.

Many years ago, one of her sons observed, “Nobody ever does anything brave in our family.” To which Maryanne had replied indignantly, “What about my Granddad’s story?” This was the trigger that prompted her to write the fictional account of a true event that occurred in 1926 in the raw farming country inland of Wairoa when her grandfather was 18 and his precious

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farm dog Blue fell 97 feet (30 metres) down a tomo. Three days later, he with two of his mates returned to rescue her in a remarkable feat of courage.

While in lockdown at Mahia, Maryanne imagined the story aloud with her husband, Paul. “He took out a fishing reel and they rolled the line across the ground. Ninety-seven feet, the enormity of it! Even a third of the way down it would feel terrifying,” she says.

Subsequently, she saw a #NZreadaloud video of her young readers measuring out 97 feet, just as Paul had done. “They too needed to see what it looked like,” she says. The sight of the children actively imagining the story, learning about knots and listening to an expert caver on a zoom call, reinforced the benefits of the programme.

“My protagonist had to be someone the children cared about, but not too perfect, he’s a bit tweeby with his glasses; he’s 15 and so is Emara. The target is middle-grade kids – they want to read about kids that little bit older than themselves and the suggestion of a love interest adds to the intrigue.”

The new reading curriculum wants children to understand our culture, where they come from and for city children to have an understanding of what life is like on a farm. “It raises issues such as, this is where the animals come from, ‘farm dogs never die of old age’, this is the dog tucker area –it’s all pretty basic and rather confronting,” she admits, but also, very authentic.

“When I started writing the story my girl was called Emily – my grandmother’s name. There she was, a young private-school girl in her hunting jacket and joddies, coming in to Wairoa with the horsefloat for the showjumping. But on a road trip with my brother to the actual location I realized it was all wrong. I had to change Emily and make her a sassy Māori girl, called Emara.”

Mary-anne’s grandson Lachie, aged 8, is a keen reader but also likes to be read to. “We were snuggled up as I read him the chapter where Emara kisses Phil the night before the rescue and he said, ‘Oh Gran, I can’t believe there’s kissing in your book.’ It was priceless,” she says.

Going into the classroom she is asked questions such as, “Will Blue be ok”, “Can you write another book about Blue’s puppies” and they send her their drawings of Blue. “The children fell in love with her and became invested in her wellbeing. But they knew something awful was going to happen.”

Mary-anne feels a huge gratitude to #NZReadaloud, that they spend the time to interpret her work, framing questions for children to explore how they feel about the raw realities of farming life, the meanings of words and the behaviours of the characters.

It’s not just reading a book, it’s studying and analyzing the text.

“I think the teachers who get involved in #NZreadaloud offer a superior experience,” she says.

“I really disliked school when I started at Tamatea Intermediate and I certainly wouldn’t read books.

Mrs Howard and #NZreadaloud played a big part in getting me over that by building my interest and reading abilities and it’s just got better and better now I’m at high school.”

LUCA THEEDOM-WHYTE

reading and evaluating books, developing learning resources, information sharing and supporting teachers. She is paid nothing for her mahi but does it because she believes so strongly in what she is doing – it’s an incredible contribution.

There is also a website from which teachers can access resources and a blog. Information and ideas are exchanged. With that mutual support teachers learn from each other using #NZreadaloud in the way that suits them and their students best.

Sandra Howard at Tamatea Intermediate, who has been working with Kerri from the start, has brought many of her own innovations to the learning method, applying them across all of the NZ Curriculum. “It has so much potential once you know what can be done with it,” she says.

While term-to-term, year-to-year numbers fluctuate (especially during the Covid period) the schools and

classroom teachers registered with #NZreadaloud form a network from Kaitaia to Bluff.

Book choices are crucial, requiring Kerri and her colleagues to read and then decide which book should be studied for the term. A very time-consuming task. Their selections, which focus on New Zealand and its culture, provide a strong connection to place and people and offer a broad scope for further inquiry by the students.

Each term a new book is chosen, to be studied across Aotearoa and the chapters for each week are set out so that every classroom is reading the same content at the same time.

Classroom in action

At Tamatea Intermediate, Sandra wants her students to follow their own interests and independent lines of inquiry, then report back to class and teacher with their learning outcomes. Her class is involved with all curriculum areas, not just reading but also with maths, history, drawing, science of the natural world and the environment; and rapidly expanding their knowledge of the digital tools.

It is self-motivated and self-directed learning.

The visionary approach is compelling. Two students who were involved in #NZreadaloud at Tamatea over the past two years recognise that it has played an integral part in who they have become as learners.

Taradale High School student, Daniel Lott says that being involved in #NZreadaloud helped him in all areas of learning. Having the opportunity to use his passion and skills for

digital technologies saw him directing his own coding projects and websites inspired by the #NZreadaloud story at the time. With the adoption of sketchnoting techniques, he said that his writing improved and he gained a critical understanding of authors’ writing techniques and these things have helped with his enjoyment of school.

Luca Theedom-Whyte, now at Havelock North High School, says, “I really disliked school when I started at Tamatea Intermediate and I certainly wouldn’t read books. Mrs Howard and #NZreadaloud played a big part in getting me over that by building my interest and reading abilities and it’s just got better and better now I’m at high school.” Besides his greater confidence, he is constantly using the sketchnote skills learned from #NZreadaloud.

“It’s great when planning an essay or while researching and when revising my notes,” he says. “My knowledge of grammar has meant my essay writing is enhanced and so is my daily leisure-time reading.”

This innovation in children’s learning has been running since 2015 and has had notable success for the many learners who have had the opportunity to be involved. The #NZreadaloud approach allows students to experience reading as active, social and connecting participants wherever they are.

Kerri and Sandra are keen to share their experience and resources with teachers and schools through the #NZreadaloud website and in-school visits within our region. https://newzealandreadaloud. wordpress.com

JULY/AUGUST 2022 • BAYBUZZ • 75

Culture

WEL L B E I N G / K AT E M C L E AY

Drink the wild air In your mind imagine yourself beach side. Feel the warm sand between your toes. The smell of the ocean. The sound of waves crashing. The taste of salt water on your tongue. Sun beating down as the ocean breeze caresses your skin.

Coast. Ocean. Mountain. River. Lake.

Waterfall. Wetland. Forest. Garden.

Where is your happy place in nature?

Put a hand on your heart and with a smile connect to that place. The sights, smells, feel, sounds and taste.

Marinade in the memory and then notice what happens within your internal landscape.

Humans have been hardwired to respond to nature since time immemorial. Even the memory of it. Not only for survival, but for a deeper sustenance. Places of prayer perch atop mountains. Ancient cultures truly revered the earth as their mother.

The father of modern medicine, Hippocrates said, “Nature itself is the best physician.” There is no denying the healing power of nature, but how important and effective is this in our fast-paced modern world?

Over the past few decades scientists have recognised some of the complex effects of nature on humans. World research shows that people who live closer to and spend consistent time in green spaces live longer with fewer health complaints.

Authors of Your Brain on Nature, physician Eva Selhub MD and naturopath Alan Logan researched the far-reaching benefits of natural environments on human wellbeing. They also explored modern day IT overload, stress and constant distractions plus their direct and insidious influence on young and old human brains. Their conclusion? The ultimate yet simple solution that time spent in nature is an antidote. A strategy for improving cognitive functioning, mental health and physical wellbeing.

More than ever the great outdoors is calling. Luckily Hawke’s Bay offers ample bounty.

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The region boasts over 350kms of varied shoreline and beaches, from the diverse Māhia Peninsula in the north to mystical Te Paerahi (Porangahau Beach) in the south. It has eight main river catchments from north to south – Wairoa, Mohaka, Esk, Tūtaekurī, Ngaruroro, Tukituki, Maraetotara/ Waimārama and Pōrangahau. There are 347 named mountains with Kaweka as the highest at 1724m. Of the ten listed waterfalls, the 58 metre Shine Falls is said to be the most spectacular. Lake Waikaremoana is the largest of the eight council-monitored lakes at 54 sq km and is surrounded by the largest tract of native rainforest in NZ, Te Urewera.

Not to mention the 200kms of bike trails, wetlands and the plethora of reserves, parks, open spaces … and then there is your own back yard.

One of the most accessible and most visited jewels in the crown of the region is its most summited peak, Te Mata, and the diverse, history-rich Te Mata Park that encompasses it. With nearly 1 million visitors a year, what makes it such a magnet for locals and visitors alike?

Ask a forestry scientist and they might mention the essential oils and the invisible chemicals (phytoncides) that trees emit. Therapies which have been found to reduce stress hormones and improve immunity. They could tell you that the most beneficial forests for healing are the virgin native forests.

They might talk of the network of roots that enable the trees to communicate with each other. Or the increase of available oxygen ready to be breathed in to dance inside you. The vitamin D from the sun delivered directly through your blood stream to your cells bringing more energy. And help balance melatonin levels that encourage better sleep.

If you talked to a NASA scientist, they might mention the innate pull of the frequency of the Earth: this atmospheric heartbeat known as the Schumann Resonance which fluctuates at around 8 hertz. Being in this frequency has been

shown to boost mood, lower blood pressure, lessen cardiovascular risks, and ease pain and inflammation.

Well known neuroscientist, lecturer and author Dr. Joe Dispenza shares his findings. “In clinical studies, we have seen that 2 hours of nature sounds a day significantly reduces stress hormones up to 800% and activates 500 to 600 DNA segments recognised as responsible for healing and repairing the body.”

A large-scale University of Exeter study in 2019 suggested that spending at least two hours a week in nature was the crucial threshold for promoting optimal health and wellbeing.

The truth is that this is beyond science and indeed beyond words. In nature and human synergy, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

Te Mata Park Trust Board member, Bruno Chambers sums it up, “There are so many drawcards and everyone gets something different – 360-degree views, expansive spaces, it’s aesthetically pleasing … there are so many parts that are so special. Everyone has their own favourite place or walk. It has a unique meaning to everybody.”

The same could be said for the very many magical places in nature that we have in this stunning region. Each of us will have our favourite places to connect with nature. But the question is: Are you spending time there often enough for them to positively impact your wellbeing?

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “Live in the sunshine, swim in the sea. Drink the wild air”. Your wellbeing mission, if you choose to accept it, is to head outside and take your friends and family with you.

Kate McLeay a mindfulness mentor, yoga teacher and retreat host based out at Cape South Country Estate and Wellness Retreat near Waimarama in Hawke’s Bay. www.katemcleay.com Photo: Giselle Reid

“Te toto o te tangata, he kai; te oranga o te tangata, he whenua.

While food provides the blood in our veins, our wellbeing is drawn from the land.”

MĀORI WHAKATAUKI (PROVERB)

Culture FO O D / I A N T H O M AS

Pie in the sky I asked over one thousand of my closest Facebook chums the where-abouts of Hawke’s Bay’s best pie.

Pie opinions are not given lightly.

They’re akin to opinions on coffee, and physios. Once we’ve found what we like we hold that point of view and state it strongly to anyone who might be swayed.

Pie recommendations I received were unequivocal: “You need look no further” … “Best pies, no question”… “Have you tried so and so’s?”

Predictably – as with coffee and physios – the answers, though given candidly as the incontrovertible truth, were all different. Even though opinions voiced on Facebook are generally very reliable, I decided to shun them all and go it alone. Pie judge and jury.

The pies we really desire are those that motivate us to make a special trip. My mission, which I had eagerly chosen to accept, was to find the Destination-Pies-Of-The-Bay – pies I would leave home for. Abandoning the idea of judging each pie against another in order to find one pie to rule them all, my new plan was to find all the pies good enough for which to make a special trip.

My second category is Detour-Pies – pies I would go out of my way for (if I was already in the car and fairly close by).

Thirdly, Dependable-Pies – those pies that do the job required, and I would buy again but wouldn’t mention in conversation.

The Don’t-Go-There-Pies bring up the tail – pies that, while hot and foodlike, leave a hollow feeling of Pie-er’s remorse.

All categories fall into the overarching Hot- Savoury-Made-In-Hawke’sBay-Pie-To-Go genus.

I’m not going to trouble you with much detail about the pies that didn’t make it to the top three groups. The

78 • BAYBUZZ • JULY/AUGUST 2022

Pie opinions are not given lightly. They’re akin to opinions on coffee, and physios. Once we’ve found what we like we hold that point of view and state it strongly to anyone who might be swayed.

less said about Don’t-Go-There-Pies the better.

My main beef, or lack of it, with the also-rans was a paucity of enthusiasm, such as ‘enthusiasm to add a good amount of good fillings’. Too many of the Bay’s pies rely on a jelly-like setting substance that holds what few ingredients there are, suspended in a shiny ‘gravy’ that glistens like a patent leather shoe but has less flavour.

The taste is of apathy, untroubled by herbs or spices. The ingredient list of this familiar, multinational, cheap-and (insert your choice of descriptor here) ‘booster’ of gravies makes grim reading. The budget end of the pie market is full of this glossy, faux-filling and very little else.

Elizabeth David said, “Never trust a chef who is mean with ingredients or time.”

With that in mind I set off early on a Monday to find out who was filling their pies with good ingredients and some love and passion. What a fantastic task! Full licence given to overindulgence in the name of research.

I cautioned myself with recollections of pies I’d eaten before. Not all of the pies I’ve eaten, obviously (too many pies in so many places), but those that offered a comestible challenge. Shattering pastry that, like confetti, covered clothes and floor.

Fillings oozing from split casing, dripping 300 degree lava-like cheese onto

bare thighs and then outstretched palms. A painful lesson learned: don’t wear shorts for the mince and cheese magma special.

Then there are past pies that have lost all sense of what it means to be a pie, their pastry collapsing, the top sliding off, half the filling having to be sucked from the messy bag. A deconstructed pie is just not appropriate for vehicular consumption.

With far too much enthusiasm, and confidence bolstered by recollections of a younger man’s pie eating prowess, I finished the day feeling a mixture of satiety, delight, disappointment, and indigestion. Four pies in a day is a pie-too-far for me, particularly as I was brought up to not waste food but to waist food. There is no doubt about who ate all the pies … I ate ALL the pies.

The highlight of day one was a weighty offering from Hollies Bakery in the Flaxmere shopping centre. A wellcrafted balance of fillings encased in good pastry.

The low point was the highly questionable potato-top pie in Mayfair. Surely the potato should be just on top rather than well into the bottom half of the pie where the other fillings should live? I was unimpressed by the mashed potato pie with a thin layer of mince beneath and as for their pork and watercress pie, I was two thirds of the way through the cress before hitting any pork.

I took day two as a rest day, having overestimated my capacity and underestimated the number of pie shops to be visited.

As word of my endeavour spread, more recommendations were offered.

It became clear that a much greater investment of time, money, note taking, and Gaviscon was required. At the time of writing I have tasted about fifteen pies and I have a further ten to try. I will reveal the results in the next issue.

Culture B O O KS / LO UI S E WA R D

The other way If there’s ever been a moment in living history where pretty much all of us have had to halt, pivot and find another way, it’s right now. With climate change a clear and present danger and a colonial, western past forcing its consequences on the present, literature, as ever, reflects the zeitgeist.

These books deal with human resilience and the landscapes that change us, as we change them.

This generation of children are familiar with the challenges and injustices faced by many in our world. I’m not a fan of scaring the daylights out of them with miserable, speculative stories of direness, but I like a story in which action is taken and something gets done. The Lost Whale by Hannah Gold is one of those stories, exquisitely illustrated throughout by Levi Pinfold.

Rio is eleven and is visiting his Californian grandmother, a woman he is meeting for only the second time.

He misses his mother so much that his pain emanates from the page; there’s a beautifully poignant passage in which his little feet fit into the grooves she made in her old bedroom floorboards as she played her violin at the window, overlooking the ocean.

Rio finds his mother’s drawings of a grey whale, White Beak, and as the story progresses, the whale’s fate becomes entwined in Rio’s mind with that of his mother, who is in the dark depths of depression and struggling to return to him.

Unexpected friendship, the difficulties of family, and the pull of the ocean and her beleaguered beasts make a

captivating tale for any reader of about eight years and up.

From the wonder of the sea, to the terror. Cristina Sanders pulls us under in her mesmeric new novel, Mrs Jewell and the Wreck of the General Grant.

Mrs Mary Jewell is twenty-two years old and recently married to Joseph who has struck gold in Australia and promises Mary an idyllic life back in Devon.

They board ship to begin their journey, and although they are living apart whilst they work their passage, life is good.

Mary is a bright, capable woman. She cares for Mrs Oat’s children, brushing their shiny thick hair. She talks with Mrs Brown, the fussy wife of the ship’s second in command. The cosy, lovely minutiae of life on board is a clever set up for the moment the reader watches, through Mary, as the ship is crushed and sunk and every one of these women and girls drown. It’s a shockingly evocative passage of writing.

Those who live wash up on the sub-Antarctic Auckland Islands. After the relief of survival comes guilt, despair and for Mary, the need to navigate her vulnerability amongst the men. A scene in which she is so wretchedly ill that she crawls back to her spot in the shelter covered in the group’s collective filth, too weak to wash herself, vividly conjures the absolute misery of her struggle.

Cristina has merged fact with fiction after detailed research into the testimony of the survivors and what emerges is a hyper-real account of the wreck and the experience of the

fourteen men and one woman who washed ashore. It’s completely riveting.

David Trubridge has created something exquisite, again. In his new book, The Other Way, he shares his photography and thoughts on his years of adventure.

The production of the book is a thing of beauty and the limited edition a technological wonder - a box, the joins of which are imperceptible, the design so smooth that the book appears as if by magic.

It’s the philosophy that’s the thing.

David’s writing is gentle but firm, his attention to detail eliciting a sense of calm and wonder from the reader: a photograph of a feather embedded in Antarctic ice; a seal flipper, its bones and skin intact even though it could have been there for a thousand years.

He makes us look, really look, like we would have as children. The images of ice and snow in this section are so clear that if you licked the page your tongue would stick to it.

David has a gentle but strong writing style – when he offers a comparison, it’s an unexpected one: Eventually this ice might run out over the sea in a glacial tongue, like those cartoon characters who run off a cliff, legs still whirring, until they realise they are in thin air.

This is his ‘love letter to the land’ … from Antarctica to Japan, to Rapa Nui and in and out of Aotearoa and many places in between.

Three fascinating books, each with something to tell us about ourselves, exactly as a good book should.

Culture MO U T H Y B R OA D / JES S S O UTA R B A RRON

Glued to the box Middle of winter, curled up on the couch with a cuppa and a cat, watching the telly, its glow outdoing the heatpump on the comfort front.

Most living rooms are orientated to face the television. We sit around it like we once did the hearth, getting our funny bone tickled, our prefrontal cortex stimulated, our heart strings plucked. We are entertained, informed, educated from the sanctuary of our settee. Connected to the Big Bad World without venturing into it through the ‘idiot box’, the ‘goggle box’, or just ‘the box’. The tube too, way before YouTube was even a glint in Google’s eye.

Like Roald Dahl’s Mike Teevee, we are swallowed up by its all-absorbing nature. It gives us solace and the illusion we are learning something, or doing something, without moving a muscle or engaging a brain cell. Part meditation, part medication: it soothes and sedates us, holds us still and tells us, “It’s all going to be alright.”

Our taste in telly defines us better than Myers-Briggs: Married at First Sight in one quadrant, Ozark, Glow and Only Fools and Horses in the others. We connect with strangers over which House we back – Team Daenerys – with the whole western world split between those who have seen all of Game of Thrones and those who have no idea who John Snow even is. Those people who understand the subtext of Lost, those who never will. Those who understand that Homer is the most astute social commentator the world will ever know and those who think I’m referencing The Odyssey.

Like food and sex, different types suit different moods, needs, life-stages.

There’s junk TV (think Bling Empire), healthy TV (ahhh, The Durrells), worthy TV (I salute you Louis Theroux), secret indulgences (Bridgerton). There’s TV that plays with your mind, seen The OA? Meta TV that plays with the tropes of TV: WandaVision’s nod to The Brady Bunch, Full House, Modern Family,

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flipping through nostalgic TV snapshots from our formative years. There’s telly too that shakes you up, Black Mirror, and cracks you up, White Lotus. Totally different; equally satisfying.

As with politics and religion, we are raised on our parents’ television choices. My foundations are built on Murder She Wrote and Open All Hours. My lullaby, the theme tune to Coronation St. I raised my first baby on Eastenders every weeknight then Omnibus on Sunday. My youngest child knows Downton Abbey’s Crawleys better than our own family. I’m avoiding having conversations with my almostgrownup daughter by watching Girls, leaving discussions of body image, sexual health, social hygiene and the dangers of drugs to the TV. I’m trying to ignore the fact she’s already seen Euphoria, and all of Sex Education (twice), believing Girls to be a more wholesome way to learn about adulting…not quite Anne with an E but not Skins either.

TV can test boundaries, ideals, biases. Atlanta, Fleabag and Flowers did more to wake me up than the News at Six ever will. For today’s young women, The Handmaid’s Tale is a way into the rights and plights of the sisterhood like the novel of the same name was for me at 16.

There is such a thing as too much of a good thing. When West Wing was finally over I could filibuster with the best of them. By the time Breaking Bad broke it off I was screaming for it to stop. Getting to the end of Shameless was harder than finishing my degree.

My own strain of Long Covid was probably brought on by spending my isolation bingeing The Wire…all 60 episodes, one of them clocking in at 93 minutes. Not since watching Mad Men in a month have I felt such a sense of achievement. Telly’s infectious.

Mad Men saw me sassing like Joan and dressing like Peggy; The Wire had me cussing like a mo-fo.

Television trivia, on its own a whole subset of time-wasting, tells us even though you can recount favourite Fawlty Towers faux-pas – bellowing “Don’t Mention the War” over and over – for days, it would only take six hours to watch the whole series. Whereas, to watch M*A*S*H in its entirety would take four times longer than the war it depicts did.

Good TV stays with us, and we stay with good TV. We’re hooked on The Tube.

The tougher life gets outside The Box, the more we live inside of it. We root for the good guys, scream at the baddies and judge our favourites like we judge our BFFs. We cry when they die (or when a season ends in a cliffhanger then doesn’t get renewed by the network so we never find out what happened to the hero (damn you Santa Clarita Diet!)).

When the writers get it right and a show ends with a finale that’s resolved, satisfying and tuned in to the tone of the rest of the series, that’s bliss.

Thank you Orange is the New Black, thank you Killing Eve, thank you After Life. With those shows, you know that’s it. Those characters are gone forever. But the makers who have taken you on that ride place you gently back on your feet in the real world, and remind you: it’s just TV, and it’s time to turn it off and get some sleep.

All shows mentioned in this column are faves, but here’s five I’m currently watching and recommend: Old Enough!

Russian Doll We Are Who We Are Master of None (Season 2) The Great

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