Flint & Steel Volume 03 - on sustainability and what we leave behind

ISSN 2382-1965 ISSN 2382-1965 9 413000 025507 9 413000 025507

Renewing the Lungs of the Land 04 | For the After-Comers 10 | Walking the Tightrope 14 Plugged In 18 | Recovering Mau RÄ kau 26 | The Things We Learn 32 | Leading by Example 37 | The Little Town that Could 42

NZD $13.95 INC GST SUMMER 2016

volume 03 - on sustainability and what we leave behind

CONTENTS Editorial Renewing the Lungs of the Land / Hannah Bartlett For the After-Comers / Alex Penk with Paul Henderson Walking the Tightrope / Athalia Harper Plugged In / Milly Du Toit Recovering Mau RÄ kau / Annette Pereira The Things We Learn / John Fox Leading by Example / Hannah Bartlett The Little Town That Could / Dale Williams

02 04 10 14 18 26 32 37 42

02 |

Commissioning Editor Lindsay Faris Publishing Editor Jeremy Vargo Sub Editors Joanne Abernethy John Fox Designer Caleb Mays Photography Claire Mossong (unless otherwise stated) Printer Westprint Publisher Maxim Institute editorial@flintandsteelmag.com flintandsteelmag.com We gratefully acknowledge the generosity of the following people for the contribution of their time and stories: Gray and Marilyn Baldwin, Mark Powell, Nikki Draper and the team at Altus Enterprises, Hon. Sir Pita Sharples, Tania Stanley, Paora Sharples, Alwyn and Karen Poole, Timothy Allan, John Gertsakis, and Paul Evans.

External contract writers were used for all articles that referenced personal connections or financial supporters of the editing team and/or Publisher.

This was done specifically to mitigate any potential conflicts of interest.

Copyright © 2015 Maxim Institute ISSN 2382-1965 Maxim Institute is a not-for-profit independent research think tank, based in Auckland.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without permission from the publishers. The views expressed in Flint & Steel are those of the respective contributors and are not necessarily shared by the publication or its staff. External contract writers were used for all articles that referenced personal connections or financial supporters of the editing team and/or Publisher. This was done specifically to mitigate any potential conflicts of interest.

EDITORIAL Welcome to the third volume of Flint & Steel.

This annual publication aims to live up to its moniker’s metaphor: we want it to spark thought and creativity. In curating a variety of ideas around a central theme each year, we hope to provide a chance for readers to think deeply about the things that affect all of us.

We are also trying to bring back the long read, by the by. Technology might have rewired many of us to read in 140 character increments, but we still believe in ink on bound paper, quiet corners, and phones on airplane mode every now and then. It’s good for humanity.

THE 2015 VOLUME: ON SUSTAINABILITY AND WHAT WE LEAVE BEHIND At the time of writing this editorial, I am due to have our second baby. It really puts things into perspective. We’re bringing a new life into this world, full of complex paradigms and paradoxes. Planet Earth; wars and waterfalls, famine and family, smartphones and novels, beaches, rivers, role-models, media, creativity, peer pressure, virtue, education, enterprise, and relationship. We are bringing new life into a world of great challenge, and beautiful hope.

In this issue of Flint and Steel we traverse the landscape of what we mean by sustainability. Not a hollow PR exercise, not a tree-hugging ideology—nor an attempt to sate our guilty hearts and minds—but a genuine search for truth, a hope to maintain, restore, and even create beauty; a call to us all to be responsible and accountable.

Not just to the land, or water, or sky, but to ‘the after-comers’—our children and grandchildren, the ones who will come after us. Those who will inherit our planet, our philosophies, our economy, our education system, our national strengths, and failures. They will inherit our proud moments and the things that make us who we are—our work ethic, our Kiwi ingenuity, our bi-cultural history, and multi-cultural reality. This issue of Flint and Steel asks the provocative question: What heritage do we wish to leave behind? What is it that we want to sustain?

In this edition you will find a collection of stories to spark your thinking around sustainability in every sense of the word. As Timothy Allan, founder of Locus Research said, “if you like New Zealand, and you like it the way it is, then you need to take responsibility for the things you do.” This sentiment applies across every article in this issue. Call it what you will—preservation, conservation, or kaitiakitanga (guardianship)—we have a responsibility to act and think in way that is sustainable.

Throughout the country, great people are grappling with what this idea means for them: their industry; their community; their family. As the editorial team approached this year’s theme, we looked to friends, colleagues, supporters, and our wider community to find just a few examples of people who are doing this well. Many of our contributors have shared with us their life’s work. They are people who we know are committed to leaving this country better than they found it, for the after-comers—often at great personal cost.

I hope that whatever your situation, with whatever responsibility you have, in whatever shape that takes, these stories will spark a passion in you for the legacy you leave for those who are to come.

Lindsay Faris, Commissioning Editor Editorial | 03

04 Renewing the Lungs of the Land

RENEWING THE LUNGS OF THE LAND HANNAH BARTLETT

Before the sun has risen, work has already begun. Hundreds of cows are herded into milking sheds, and while they tuck into the morning’s feed, New Zealand’s biggest export begins its journey from cow to consumer.

While for some, farming may conjure up notions of the “simple life”, the decisions made between sunrise and sunset on commercial dairy farms affect not only the farmer’s back pocket, they are shaping the landscape of New Zealand’s economic and environmental future.

I

t’s fair to say that Gray Baldwin is a man of the land. Overseeing a 290ha dairy farm in the heart of Putaruru, with rolling hills dotted with cows and lined with fences, Gray and his wife Marilyn are a picture of quintessential Kiwi farming. Both are steeped in farming tradition: Gray’s father and grandfather were sheep and beef farmers in the heyday of sheep farming in New Zealand, while Marilyn was born and bred on a dairy farm in the Manuwatu. Now they live in a home atop a hill, complete with gravel road, pet lamb out the back, and gumboots lined up at the back door.

While the scene is picturesque, Gray and Marilyn—like all New Zealand farmers—are at the centre of a matrix of responsibilities.

Managing profitable farming practices while caring for the ecology that sustains their livelihood, and finding the modern balance between farming tradition and a growing consumer influence on the ethics of the industry.

The first problem? Those cows dotting the hills, or more specifically, what comes out of them, and where it goes. Grazing stock leave manure and urine, rich in nitrates and phosphates on the paddocks. When it rains, these nutrients wreck havoc on surrounding waterways, and the ecosystems that depend on them. While effluent from the sheds and barns is captured and turned into fertiliser, runoff

from the fields will flow into the Pokaiwhenua Stream, and ultimately the Waikato River. The Baldwins are on a mission to fix it.

“If you were a farmer a hundred years ago, and a little bit of effluent [ended up in the river] it wouldn’t matter a sausage because it’d flow down to the ocean in around three days,” says Gray. “Now it takes months for water to get through the Waikato River system.”

Nine hydro dams have changed the flow of the Waikato River.

Combined with pipelines that now deliver an increasing amount of Auckland’s water supply northward, you’ve got an entirely different environment that Gray says they have to take into account when thinking about the impact their waste will have on the water system.

“1.5 million Aucklanders wanting a clean shower versus 600 farmers [in the district] trying to make a living? Unless we change what we do now, we will not be farming here, doing what we’ve done for years, particularly dairying.”

With this challenge in mind, the Baldwins have started a journey to restore the natural wetlands on their property, to stay ahead of eventual government intervention they expect will see legislation specify levels of nitrate a farm can have in runoff.

Where others have sought improvements by restricting the number of stock, or holding animals in sheds, Gray and Marilyn are

Hannah Bartlett

| 05

06 Renewing the Lungs of the Land

first looking to the land; specifically the swampy wetland terrain that Gray calls the “lungs of the land.”

Wetlands are not particularly beloved. Along with marshes and swamps, they’re often synonymous with dangers, delays, and problems. But their thick mats of plants and water catch waste water, breaking down its chemicals and runoff­—processing, absorbing, and neutralising pollutants before they flow into the river system.

On farms all over New Zealand, previous generations of farmers drained the wetlands on their farms, turning swamps into flat paddocks—maximising grazing pasture and tidying up the landscape. This practice has been so widespread in rural and urban settings that over the past 100 years, New Zealand has lost 90% of its wetlands.

Now the thinking is beginning to change. Farmers, like everyone, are beginning to think about ways they can best counteract environmental damage. Inspired by advice from acclaimed environmentalist Gordon Stephenson, who visited their farm and saw the potential of the low-lying paddock as a restored wetland, the Baldwins decided to test the theory—and measure how much the wetlands could do in the fight against farm runoff.

The Baldwins’ reinstated wetlands cover just over one percent of their farmland: seven interconnected ponds nestled at base of the surrounding hills.

The ponds are planted with 12,500 wetland plants funded in collaboration through Dairy NZ, the Waikato River Authority, and the Waikato Regional Council, as well as various environmental groups, interested researchers, and local iwi.

When it rains, the runoff flows down the hills, through the water catchment that streams down the centre of the farm and into the first of the ponds. There it’s caught in its tracks, straining through the thick web of plants which digest and filter the nitrates and phosphates from the water, before the rush meets the river.

The National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research (NIWA) has put $30,000 monitors at the start and finish of the pond process—to measure nitrate levels going in and coming out—which will give an indication of the effectiveness of the wetland project.

NIWA Principal Scientist Dr Chris Tanner says the Baldwins’ project is going to be helpful in understanding just how effective a wetland project can be: at present there’s very little information about exactly how much they can reduce nitrate levels. There is curiosity across the industry about how restored wetlands might serve farmers, but farmers are cautious, especially given how much money has been spent on converting them into useful paddocks.

Dr Tanner says it’s all about changing perspectives, and increasing understanding. “I think there’s real value not only in [Gray and Marilyn] doing what they’re doing, but also getting some

Hannah Bartlett

| 07

information to help other people to quantify the performance of the system. [It will] help other farmers and even regulatory agencies to give farmers credit for the value of wetlands in improving the water quality.”

With so few wetland projects out there, Dr Tanner says all eyes are on these experiments, with proponents eager to get verified data that would encourage farmers to return to nature’s water filters, to help them clean up the waterways.

“If [farmers] change their thinking around, they can say ‘Well [this patch of land] could be more valuable to me as [an effluent] mitigation option than it would be spending a lot of money trying to make it into a high producing little bit of pasture.’”

The tension of working the land profitably and sustainably is just one of the many delicate balancing acts farmers need to perform.

With modern consumers ever more aware of the ethical ramifications of their purchasing power, farmers are grappling with a merry-goround of expectations, from consumers that don’t necessarily know the full impact of their demands on farming practice.

To illustrate this point, Gray shares the story of his neighbour, a farmer who responded to market demand for free-range eggs; making a huge investment to bring his hens out of the barn.

“The chooks, in the interest of animal welfare are being taken

08 Renewing the Lungs of the Land

outside, and causing an environmental mess, because they poop all over the land and it gets washed into the river. And on dairy farms here and overseas, farmers are building million-dollar barns, pouring all this concrete, with a massive carbon footprint, to take the cows into the barn [to minimise excrement on the land], which becomes what?

A compromise to animal welfare. Cows prefer to be ‘free range.’”

The Baldwins have a similar story to share. Before the global financial crisis hit, the word on everyone’s lips was “organic.”

Fonterra heralded the opportunity, offering a big premium for organic dairy products. Gray and Marilyn grabbed the bull by the horns and became a fully organic dairy farm for seven years, before deciding it wasn’t for them.

The biggest deterrent? The environmental impact.

For a farm to be certified organic, farmers have to jump through a lot of hoops. For instance, there can be no tanalised timber used in structures on the farm, meaning that large scale organic farmers replace treated wood with unnecessary amounts of concrete, which has a larger ecological footprint. Add to this the fuel burned to truck in specialist supplements and detergent to use in farm management, the amount of coal burnt in the sterilisation of milk processing plants, and the environmental impact of one organic milk truck driving all over the North Island each day to collect milk from a few

organic farms. Going organic turned out to be a venture the Baldwins didn’t think was environmentally or economically sustainable, even before Fonterra cut the premiums.

Part of this expense and inefficiency could be tagged to the small number of farmers willing to get on board—if every farmer was certified organic, then the efficiencies of the entire dairy system would cut out the waste required to sustain a niche industry. Gray notes that a lot of farmers tend to be of the “wait and see” frame of mind. The Baldwins, however, are no strangers to being alone in their way of doing things. They also only milk their cows once a day, which they believe is both kinder to the animals and yields better results in the long term, as they don’t lose as much weight in the Spring, meaning they can be back in calf sooner. While this makes them somewhat of a curiosity in the dairy industry, Gray thinks a big reason why twice-daily milking is the norm across New Zealand is simply because people think “that’s how it’s always been done.”

The Baldwins don’t approach anything with a “but that’s how we’ve always done it” approach

For them, finding innovative ways to marry commercial and environmental sustainability is not just a nice “to-have,” it’s an imperative.

After all, for Gray and Marilyn this isn’t just a business, they’re hoping to pass on a legacy.

As Gray says, “My definition of sustainability is ‘can we be doing it in a hundred years time?’ I see us as trying to have the benefits of a profitable commercial dairy farm but realising we have to change the way we do it if we’re going to carry on.”

Gray and Marilyn are acutely aware of the ethical and environmental challenges facing New Zealand’s producers and consumers, and they are looking for ways to change what they do to protect the life they love, in an industry that helped establish our country. But while forging ahead with a wetland project that may carve out a fresh path for farmers across the country, the dreams dearest to Gray’s heart are a little closer to home…

“I’d like my kids and grandkids to have the chance to go farming.” •

Hannah is a journalist for NZME, working in the Newstalk ZB newsroom. She recently finished her postgraduate journalism studies at AUT, after spending a number of years working in communications. With experience in the non-profit sector in the United States, Hannah has a strong interest in civic education and social justice. When she’s not juggling the early mornings and late nights of radio journalism, she enjoys getting caught up in crime novels, and watching Christmas movies all year round.

Hannah Bartlett

| 09

10 | For the After-Comers

FOR THE AFTER-COMERS ALEX PENK WITH PAUL HENDERSON

What do we value? There are structures of society, gifts of nature, and rights of our democracy that we can take for granted— foundations of our way of life we inherit from the hard fought decisions of generations past. What we do now will shape the legacy we leave to the generations to come.

A

fter-comers cannot guess the beauty been.” In 1879, Gerard Manly Hopkins lamented the destruction of a line of trees with this line of poetry. He captures a sense of loss that we’ve all felt when something that we love has been destroyed. But more than that, he captures the loss of those who will never have a chance to know what we loved. There is a gap where those trees once stood, a gap that future generations will see but will never perceive.

Hopkins isn’t just mourning a few trees. He’s touching on a far deeper idea, a concept we now know as “sustainability.” It’s a word that seems to be on the tip of everybody’s tongue in the last few years, applied to everything from fisheries to our shopping habits.

We’re probably most familiar with it as an environmental concept, but at heart the concern for sustainability includes everything that’s necessary for fully human lives. Perhaps the current emphasis reflects a timely recognition that when we fail to sustain that which is truly precious, the result will be human misery.

Sustainability is a timeless idea because it means protecting the precious things that we all need; experiencing them in a way that makes room for future generations to enjoy them too.

It matters in every area of life, and it’s a moral obligation that we owe to our ancestors and our descendants—the obligation of stewardship.

Imagine that you’ve been the victim of a crime, but the police turn a blind eye because the criminal paid them off, or that you live somewhere where government ministers take bribes to give out favours and award state contracts. We take it for granted that this won’t happen in New Zealand, and we’re rightly proud that we’ve sustained a political culture where transparency is the norm and corruption is almost non-existent—but not everyone has this culture, as New Zealand firms sometimes find out when they do business overseas.

Now imagine a world where trust has been eroded by a history of family members informing on each other to totalitarian authorities.

That’s not something a novelist made up, that’s part of the legacy that affects many people in modern China. Or try to put yourself in a situation where companies lie about their performance and manipulate their finances to deceive investors, markets, and regulators and line their own pockets. Then recall the fraud and insider trading that took place at Enron, and remember that we need a strong culture of ethics to sustain individual firms and the economies they make up.

Alex Penk with Paul Henderson

|

11

Then think of a country where being accepted and participating in society means giving up your language and culture, and adopting the views, language, and customs of another tradition so that the day comes when almost no-one speaks the native language, and where traditional knowledge and customs are in danger of extinction as accepted ways of building lives and communities together. Losing these precious things—these taonga—is all too painfully real for many Māori and other indigenous cultures around the world, who now strive to regain and sustain the culture of their forebears; honouring their heritage and identity.

In 1997, one of my former colleagues was living in Brunei, wearing a full face respirator that looked like a World War I gas mask.

Sleeping was a problem, and going out meant being completely enveloped by an amorphous wall of acrid white smoke from forest fires in neighbouring Indonesia—started to clear rainforest for palm oil plantations. His wife and their children had evacuated to Christchurch because their young lungs were vulnerable to the haze. The fires were so intense that the peat below ground caught alight, making it impossible to put them out. In the end, the fires ate themselves out, but not before they had devoured millions of hectares of rainforest and ravaged people’s health and lives. If this sounds familiar, it’s because the same thing is happening today.

These brief examples show that there are many areas where we need to act sustainably—politics, social relationships, economics, culture, and the environment, to name a few.

Because we need each of these areas to live well, we can’t simply prioritise one above the others. It’s not real sustainability if business is booming but we’re abusing the environment. Likewise, it’s not real sustainability if we’re keeping the environment pristine by preventing people from using resources in a reasonable way to make a living. In real life, we have to make trade-offs between each of these areas, and that will often be messy and uncertain—what kind of resource use is reasonable and how much is sustainable? The point is that we should be thinking about each of these areas together.

This thinking is part of our moral obligation to be good stewards.

The term “stewardship” isn’t fashionable like sustainability, but it paints a fuller picture of what sustainability is, and why it’s not optional.

To be a steward is to take care of something that belongs to someone else—using it in a way that person would approve of,

and handing it back undamaged or, preferably, improved. The great statesman, Edmund Burke, used the analogy of a trust or a partnership between “those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.”

Each generation receives an inheritance from their ancestors, and one day we’ll pass on an inheritance to our descendants. It won’t be ours forever, so we don’t have the right to use it all for ourselves.

Instead, it’s our duty to pass it on as good as when we got it, if not better.

Of course, what our ancestors leave to us isn’t always good.

Think of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, straining to break the inherited yoke of racist oppression and law. That’s why the obligation to be a steward isn’t simply to maintain what we’re given, but to improve it where necessary. To do this, we need to know if something in our inheritance is missing or distorted, which means we have to talk about what we need in order to live well, and we have to teach this to our children. Of course, we’ll never get it perfect—racism didn’t end in the 1960s. That’s why improving, sustaining and keeping our inheritance is a continual task, one that requires us to learn and renew, rediscover and recreate.

Think of this task in terms of Hopkins’ trees. There are “aspens” in our world: beautiful, important, life-sustaining things that have grown up around us, that we may even take for granted. Think of those things that we’d grieve for if they were mown down, the things we’d have to slowly and painstakingly regrow. And then think of the gratitude that we owe to the people who planted those for us a long time ago; not for their own enjoyment, but for the after-comers.

Sustainability is both a challenge and an opportunity; we can either pass on a desolate gap that after-comers will never perceive, or bless them with a richer inheritance than we received. To be a good steward, sustaining the things we need to live well, is one way we live out the golden rule: treat others as you want to be treated.

Ultimately, therefore, sustainability is about love. Love for the person beside us, their children, and the world that is our home. •

The CEO of Maxim Institute, Alex joined the think tank in December 2005 after completing a Master of Laws at Cambridge University. Starting as a researcher, he held positions as Policy and Research Manager and Executive Director of Maxim, before his appointment as CEO in 2013. Alex holds degrees in law and science from the University of Auckland. Before leaving for Cambridge, he practised law with one of New Zealand's largest firms.

Paul is married to Elizabeth, and has three daughters. He is a partner in an educational technology startup that aims to provide a safe digital learning environment for children. He blogs regularly on education, technology, and culture at paulehenderson.wordpress.com

12

| For the After-Comers

BINSEY POPLARS GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS

felled 1879 My aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled, Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun, All felled, felled, are all felled; Of a fresh and following folded rank Not spared, not one That dandled a sandalled Shadow that swam or sank On meadow & river & wind-wandering weed-winding bank.

O if we but knew what we do When we delve or hew — Hack and rack the growing green!

Since country is so tender To touch, her being sÓ slender, That, like this sleek and seeing ball But a prick will make no eye at all, Where we, even where we mean To mend her we end her, When we hew or delve: After-comers cannot guess the beauty been.

Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve Strokes of havoc unselve The sweet especial scene, Rural scene, a rural scene, Sweet especial rural scene.

Alex Penk with Paul Henderson

|

13

WALKING THE TIGHTROPE ATHALIA HARPER

Put your money where your mouth is. It’s a challenge that applies equally to big business and individual purchases in today’s moral marketplace. Athalia Harper explores the ethical give and take between corporate and consumer.

14 | Walking the Tightrope

P

eople, planet, profits. This is the catch-cry of sustainable business­—the new triple bottom line. Gone are the days when businesses could just care about balancing profits and losses— the new normal means businesses now have a mandate to care for the environment and society at large—the borrowed phrase “first, do no harm” now seems applicable.

It’s an admirable standard. Surely today we can hold businesses to account and demand that they care. Surely we can expect businesses to do better than they have in the past.

That said, I am faced with my own conundrum when nature, quite literally, comes to call. My two-year old needs toilet training fast and, a mad dash to my local discount retailer later, I find myself the slightly ashamed owner of a rather ugly, very cheap plastic toilet step and potty-training insert.

I’m ashamed because I know I have just bought the step as a stopgap. I plan to replace it in a few weeks for something a bit more long lasting, made from better materials, and definitely more attractive. At only $5 it was an easy decision—I knew my bank account wouldn’t feel the pinch—but now, a short way through an article on sustainability, I do feel a bit guilty.

I’m torn. Do I dump and replace? No one will notice my solitary ugly, green stool amongst the acres of refuse at the city dump, I think. Or do I keep it; its ugly green hide a constant reminder to make better purchasing decisions in the future.

It’s in my purchase of this eyesore that I can see the heart of the consumer problem, the almost unmanageable challenge we set for businesses today. Our insatiable demand for low-cost goods combined with a moral call that “they” (those “faceless corporations”) care for people and planet.

CEO Mark Powell is a man well versed with the complexities of this challenge. He helms The Warehouse Group, a Retail Group that includes The Warehouse, Warehouse Stationery, Noel Leeming, and Torpedo7. He wrestles daily with both the commitment to provide low-cost consumer goods and the vision to become a 100-year company that helps New Zealand flourish. A true challenge to balance profit, people, and planet.

“Business is often caricatured in today’s media,” says Mark.

“Most of the business leaders I know are not capricious capitalists; they do care passionately about society.”

Despite this, managing profits and losses alongside the call to compassionate care of people and the environment is a tall order. There is a fine balance and it’s evident after a few moments conversation with Mark that big business does not have a cut and dried solution; there are indeed no easy answers, particularly for businesses competing in the market of low-cost consumer goods.

Challenges range from balancing the triple bottom line, avoiding bankruptcy while fulfilling moral and ethical obligations, through to bigger questions like: “What exactly is the greater good? What does real sustainability look like?”

Take ethical product sourcing for example. A seemingly easy, yet extreme response to continued reports of sweatshop labour,

would be to close the doors of the West and shut down free trade, a response that Mark finds simplistic and unhelpful.

“Building a wall around the West is not a solution,” he says.

“It’s important that we don’t go and throw the baby out with the bath water. We need to remember that global trade has actually lifted hundreds of millions out of abject poverty in China, India, and many other countries.”

His defense that global trade actually contributes over time to raised incomes and better quality of life—doing more for poverty in developing countries than any aid organisation could do—feels like sound logic; the burgeoning middle classes of China and India living proof. But should that “greater good” override our concern around the reports of unethical labour, child workers, and terrible working conditions we see coming from many manufacturing nations?

“There are undoubtedly abuses. You can’t be naïve in this space, but the general improvements happening are huge,” Mark responds.

“An important part of what makes market-led economies work is the democracy and questioning that puts pressure on people in power and asks: ‘Is wealth being shared? Is trickle down happening?’

Because of that, major companies like ourselves feel the social pressure to have good, ethical sourcing policies in place, because if you don’t, you will get caught out. Consumer-led pressure, societalpressure, that’s what drives change.”

Mark holds a similar view on the “Made in NZ” movement.

Consumer-led pressure for locally sourced products is, he says “good.”

But he doesn’t believe it should turn into a “Protect NZ” movement.

“As soon as we do this,” he says, “you undermine creativity and fossilise a society…free trade puts a great creative pressure on New Zealand manufacturers and helps our country to move forward.”

This “vote-with-your-feet” philosophy does sit a little bit uncomfortably with me. It places great onus on the individual, and I’m not sure I trust myself to make the “right” choice, especially in light of my recent foray into the world of garish toilet steps. Surely, I ask, there must be room for some regulation, some government intervention, some limits to consumer choice, and some guidance for corporate responsibility?

Mark does believe there is a place for government intervention.

Just not overregulation. He believes the State’s role, worldwide, not just here at home is to ensure that base levels of protection are in place, a responsibility he extends also to the governments of developing countries. These include health and safety standards and a minimum wage, but should not, for example, extend to the legislation of the so called “Living Wage”.

Athalia Harper

|

15

This strikes me as slightly ironic. The Warehouse Group has implemented an initiative called the “Career Retailer Wage,” which has raised the wages of qualifying long term front-line staff by anywhere between $50 to $100 a week, seemingly in response to the challenge of the Living Wage.

While the initial dollar figure of the Living Wage movement was a useful benchmark for the Career Retailer Wage, Mark says the similarities end there. Unlike the Living Wage concept, the Career Retailer Wage is not a minimum for all employees, it is essentially there to support those who are committed to turning retail into a career.

Mark believes that the question the Living Wage movement is asking is very valid: “Long-term employees in many industries—how much are they being paid?” Living, he believes, should be sustainable for these individuals, but legislating a blanket Living Wage? That’s a whole other ball game. The Career Retail Wage initiative costs The Warehouse Group an extra $6 million a year, he tells me, a price they, as a large organisation, are willing and able to bear.

That said, he believes that legislating this would impose an unsustainable burden on smaller businesses, particularly start-ups, and could be crippling. “They just can’t afford that,” he says, “but they should pay at least minimum wage. And it [wages] should be progressive.”

Herein lies an additional challenge.

16 | Walking the Tightrope

There can be a fine line, it appears, between keeping a business alive and meeting the ideals of sustainable business, a tightrope we walk between people, profit, and planet.

What choice do you make when the cost of a decision could mean a foreclosure sign on your door?

There are no comfortable answers to that question, and Mark would caution that demanding businesses adhere to a so-called “obvious” ethical, moral line beyond what is legislated may in fact do more harm than good.

“Crippling businesses, particularly start-ups and entrepreneurial ventures,” he says, “will cripple creativity and ultimately cripple society.”

The discussion around this challenge really hits home for The Warehouse Group when the subject turns to the end life of products.

“This is an issue we care greatly about,” Mark says, “but recycling and take-back programmes are just not sustainable on an economic basis for a single company to do on their own. There is a lot that we do recycle already, but the options on offer are not as stable or as strong as you would hope.”

Rather than dismissing the issue, The Warehouse Group has spent years lobbying the government for a charge on goods that would fund an industry-wide solution.

“We haven’t seen heaps of action on this though,” comments Mark, “There is stuff happening but not as quickly as we would like.”

Again, there is the tightrope. The ethical choice is to care, to respond, and ultimately to deliver, but again the question remains: “should business sustainability come at the cost of sustaining the business?”

There is no easy answer. Mark’s favourite saying is: “Flourishing society needs flourishing businesses and flourishing businesses need flourishing societies.” It strikes me that this relationship between business and society may, in fact, be a symbiotic one.

Perhaps, like all good relationships, there is no one size fits all handbook for decision-making. Sure, there may be some clear moral and ethical boundaries, there may be some guidelines for good behaviour, but there is also a lot of grey. Like all relationships, there are times when one party may temporarily miss out while the other gains, but overall there is a commitment to a common good. And this is a long-term game.

It strikes me that there is a similarity between my poor choice of a stopgap toilet step and the larger choices that need to be made around business sustainability. While my choice was a simple, albeit foolish one, and sustainable choices are more complex, they do both need a long-term view. Stopgaps, easy answers, and quick fixes may in fact end up doing much more damage in the long run.

I am left asking myself, as I demand that businesses do better, am I willing to do the same?

Am I prepared to pay more for goods that benefit others, goods that have been produced with minimal harm to the planet? Am I prepared to have less in order for others to have more?

I wish I could answer with a resounding “Yes,” but, in truth, this challenge leaves me uncomfortable, I am uncertain of my own resolve. For now though, at the least, I commit to keeping my garish, green toilet step—a domestic eyesore serving as a reminder that my decisions matter, that they impact others; and the cost for them is much more than just décor. •

Athalia Harper is a freelance copywriter and marketing strategist passionate about telling good stories, be those personal, business, or brand. A Maxim Institute Internship Alum, Athalia holds a Bachelor of Communications from AUT, and worked in Video Production and Marketing before landing on her current career path. She currently lives in Auckland with her husband and vivacious two-year old, and is due with her second in early 2016.

Athalia Harper

|

17

18 | Plugged In

PLUGGED IN PHOTOGRAPHY BY MILLY DU TOIT

For some of us, it’s a challenge to find a workplace where you can fit in, and be accepted for who you are and what you can do. Altus Enterprises is a business that employs over 180 people with disabilities working in a supportive work place. But this is no charity. Here you’ll find people working real jobs, filling contracts from some of the biggest companies in the country.

Altus offers their staff the opportunity to be self-sustaining; a life achievement that would be otherwise unattainable for many here. Most importantly, when you walk through the doors, there’s a hum of happy activity, and a palpable sense of satisfaction: it’s a job well done.

Milly Du Toit

| 19

20 | Plugged In

Milly Du Toit

|

21

Staff sort the tangled piles of headphones, delivered by the bag-load from nearby Auckland International Airport. They plug in each set to ensure good working order, and hang them on racks. In the next room, lines of people are busily inserting fresh earpieces, coiling cables and re-bagging; recycling 17,000 headsets per day, ready to accompany Air New Zealand customers on their next journey. This mammoth task is just one of many that go on in these walls, including packaging recycled fabrics for use on worksites, putting together products for Black Box cartons, manufacturing plastic pipe, and more.

22 | Plugged In

Milly Du Toit

| 23

24 | Plugged In

Milly Du Toit

| 25

RECOVERING MAU RĀKAU ANNETTE PEREIRA PHOTOGRAPHY BY MILLY DU TOIT The river flows, the seasons turn, The sparrow and starling have no time to waste.

If men do not build How shall they live?

“Chorus From The Rock” by T.S. Eliot

26 | Recovering Mau Rākau

I

n July this year, news sites around the world reported the story of schoolboys, 1,700 strong in number, performing a haka outside Palmerston Boy’s High School to greet the coffin of their teacher who had passed away.

The Telegraph in London and TIME magazine placed the video on their websites. In a world weighted with ethnic conflict and still licking wounds from colonialism, clearly this is newsworthy.

And yet, just a generation or two ago, that news could not have appeared. While the unfolding story of the Māori Renaissance is still relatively short, to the outside eye it has already produced astounding fruit.

The rekindling of Māori culture has not happened by chance but rather through work and vision, adaptation and preservation.

Sustaining and rebuilding Māori culture has involved wrestling with complex questions: What does it mean to sustain a culture and identity when so much has already been lost? What does it take to rebuild in the dark?

One context in which answers to these questions have unfolded is in the revival of mau rākau—the use of Māori weaponry—through urban marae. The revival of mau rākau is a rarely told story that has played a key part in reacquainting many Māori with their heritage and identity.

Mau rākau is a type of martial art. It involves wielding the taiaha (spear) and patu (club). But its significance lies beyond art or sport.

For Māori, taiaha and patu are gifts of the gods, woven into Māori identity from the earliest days. According to the Hon. Sir Pita Sharples, Tohunga Ahurewa and Te Tumuwhakarae founder of Te Whare Tū Taua o Aotearoa: The House of Warfare and Māori Weaponry, the taiaha “encompasses our deepest customs and is our identity.”

Mau rākau indicates more than battle. Language, maturity, traditional lore, and tribal custom are all attached to it. The implications of its erosion during much of the twentieth century therefore also extend beyond the loss of an activity or sport. With the suppression of mau rākau, keys to Māori identity were hidden.

The Tohunga Suppression Act which came into force in 1907 was intended to direct Māori away from traditional healers and towards Western medicine. However, it was also instrumental in putting pressure on the already fragile roots of Māori identity, making it illegal for tohunga—spiritual healers and cultural leaders—to pass on their knowledge. Mau rākau was largely buried along with carvings and Te Reo during this period.

The Tohunga Suppression Act did not achieve all it intended.

Māori fears of Western medicine were not alleviated and few people were prosecuted under it. Tohunga continued to hand down their knowledge in secret. But while the Act in some senses failed, it nonetheless had significant implications. It damaged the bonds that many had with their whakapapa and made Tohunga marginal figures.

Some Māori internalised a belief that their culture was inferior and dangerous. When the Act was lifted in 1962 it left a long shadow.

“Our proverbs say the land and sea and us grew up together. To have that taken away from you, you are left without your spiritual encasement,” says Hon. Sir Pita Sharples.

Without the tools for retaining history and culture, identity stretches thin and frays. For the best part of the twentieth century, most Māori children were raised by whānau who spoke to them in English and hid their culture.

“I was told that Te Reo and Kapahaka would get me nowhere” says Tat Stanley, one of the first female students to master mau rākau and obtain the title Tohunga Kairangi of Te Whare Tū Taua O Aotearoa.

Tat is from Taranaki but when she was eight she moved with cousins to Auckland. Like many Māori of her era, she was raised away from her traditional tribe, in an urban context, not a rural one.

The Hoani Waititi Marae in West Auckland, one of the key sites for the regeneration of mau rākau, has been the site for Tat’s own self-regeneration too.

For many Māori of her era, cultural identity is an improvised affair, and reconnecting with it is a source of life and pride.

“I came here [to Hoani Waititi Marae] when I was fifteen and it has been very important to me. It was here that I started to learn mau rākau. Without mau rākau I wouldn’t be who I am today,” says Tat. Urban marae have become key initiatives to allow people like Tat to adapt to a changing environment while retaining their cultural identity. With many Māori now living in urban centres these marae were built to bring people together from different iwi. Māori recognised the need to move forward and sustain their culture in a new context.

“When urban marae were established it was a huge mindset shift for people. Marae used to belong to just one iwi. To build a marae like Hoani Waititi was a big change,” says Paora Sharples, son of Sir Pita, and one of the first generation of students to have mastered mau rākau.

“If you go into our marae it is full of carvings from every tribe, all the wakas, so anyone who comes here, they can be related,” says Paora. The walls of the marae even feature carved reliefs of the Endeavour and Abel Tasman’s ship; the wakas that brought Pākehā to Aotearoa, New Zealand.

“That is all part of our history too,” Paora explains.

So what were the watershed moments that allowed an eroding culture to find its feet again? What brought mau rākau and other aspects of Māori culture out from the dark? According to Paora, it began with the protest movements of the 1960s and 70s which broke open a doorway that allowed the broader renaissance of Māori culture that would follow.

In 1975, five thousand people walked the length of the North

Annette Pereira | 27

Island to protest for Māori land rights. Students campaigned for Te Reo to be taught and protected.

The era of protest broke open new attitudes to New Zealand’s identity as a bi-cultural nation. The cry of Māoridom that their language and tikanga should not be allowed to die was the cry of a people deeply invested in the maintenance and rediscovery of their own identity, and determined that it should not be lost.

The untidy and sometimes controversial movements of that era brought to the forefront of the nation’s mind the redressing of grievance, and the vitality of Māori identity. Although this bi-cultural conversation has been deeply fraught and sometimes painful, there are few in New Zealand who would wish to return to the 1960s. In this sense, the new depth of conversation between the Treaty partners has been a gift to us all.

Rebuilding has meant more than just returning to the past or trying to unwind history. It has meant moving forward and finding out how to be Māori in a new context.

Weapons were brought out from hiding.

“At first we didn’t know much [about mau rākau],” says Sir Pita.

“When we started we had no rules because not many of us had the knowledge. But there are rules and conventions in the use of weapons.”

“Those who did know, started teaching it one-on-one. We began to reestablish the conventions and therefore the goodness of the weapons. They began to be used for every sort of use—healing and traditions. A whole lot of things began to revive through this,” says Sir Pita.

28 | Recovering Mau Rākau

The art-form itself guided them as they rediscovered it. The students found that mau rākau became a way of expanding their own conception of themselves, proving to be an entry point into the recovery of identity.

“When we first started it was all about the moves. We did that for years. We got to a point where we thought, ‘we need to be fit.’ So we researched all these regimes of training and fitness that related to mau rākau. Once we were fit, we realised that perhaps we should all be speaking Māori, to honour the art-form as best we can. So we put ourselves on courses or found ways to learn Te Reo. Through all this, the tikanga, the customary aspects came back as well,” says Paora. “It was like clawing back what had happened to us, and trying to make us whole again.”

The recovery of a sustainable cultural identity is not simply about the revivification of traditional forms. Like all cultural customs and traditional knowledge, mau rākau has been adapted as it has been reawakened. Initially, many people were reluctant to see women learning mau rākau, due to their traditional role as child bearers.

“Back when this first started there were no women allowed,” says Tat. “But as the years went on, a wahine approached Papa [Sir Pita] and asked if she could learn. The doors opened up. There were a lot of debates that went around the table.”

As they retold and remembered more of their history, they discovered stories of female fighters in ancient battles, allowing Tat and others like her to take their rightful place alongside those reviving the art-form.

“It was a turning point as women, to be a part of this. Being a huge honour, we didn’t take it lightly, and it gave a sense of balance to mau rākau as well.”

Annette Pereira | 29 Photo: Claire Mossong

Sir Pita believes this is a normal part of the development of culture. “Like all art forms, if you do it all the time it develops.”

The students who began learning mau rākau in the late 1980s early 90s did not know where it would lead. But as their knowledge of the art deepened, so too did their commitment. For Tat, this ultimately meant returning to her home in Taranaki, to connect with her identity.

“After several years, it was the taiaha that told me ‘right it’s time for you to go home and to learn about who you are, where you are from.’”

Today there are 36 people, including Tat and Paora who have mastered all eight stages of mau rākau through Te Whare Tū Taua o Aotearoa. The art has been formalised with a grading system and schools now spread throughout New Zealand and beyond. There are Te Whare Tū Taua branches in Australia, London, and Hawaii. Many young people who learn mau rākau today begin like Tat and Paora, with a simple desire to learn the moves, but through it they uncover much more.

“We have used an art that was once for warfare, as a vehicle for education. We teach other things like our language, customs, history,” says Paora. “It is about thinking Māori, not only doing it.”

The story of mau rākau speaks volumes about how identity is sustained. This identity is about more than the recovery of a mechanical form, it is about the curing of the soul—the reconnection of the whole person. This kind of “soul craft” includes the recovery of ancient knowledge, the discovery of the importance of community, tikanga, discipline, the deepening and securing of language, the reconnection with history, and the transmission of it to the next generation who will also earn their right to own and keep it.

The story of 1,700 students performing the haka together in honour of their teacher is stirring because it shows us what education, properly conceived, is for. Education must remind ourselves and our children of the standing places we value, the identity we hold, the knowledge we share. If we allow it to do this, our children will not be cultural orphans but proud inheritors of an enduring trust. It is that trust that we all share. •

Annette was born and raised in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney and moved to New Zealand in her early twenties. She interned and then worked for Maxim Institute as Communications Manager for five years—a time that significantly shaped her vocationally and personally. For the past few years Annette has focused on work that involves the strengthening and rebuilding of civil society. She has worked for the Centre for Social Justice in London and is now back in Australia working for a faith-based NGO.

30 | Recovering Mau Rākau

Annette Pereira |

31

Photo: Claire Mossong

32 | The Things We Learn

THE THINGS WE LEARN JOHN FOX

I passed by the school where I studied as a boy and said in my heart: here I learned certain things and didn't learn others. All my life I have loved in vain the things I didn't learn.

“The School Where I Studied” by Yehuda Amichai (1999)

T

here’s always a teacher you remember. The one like Rose Carruthers, who took a five year old me, by the hand. The one like Jo Barry, who encouraged me to blow the dust off my parents’ Shakespeare book, and read it. The one like Craig Croft, who dished out press ups, lines, and confidence, and taught me Biology, and how to look the world in the eye. If we’re lucky, we can close our eyes, and summon the moment: the one where we were understood, the moment we got it and threw it back, the conversation we were suddenly able to join, the moment the light went on.

That is education’s priceless grace: the contribution it makes to people.

It is not simply a matter of knowing things, and being able to use them, or feelings and personal growth. At its best, education shapes us as a people, a form of social self-renewal.

In our systems for the training of our children, we reveal the things we value, the things we aspire to, and the things we love. In education, too, we “draw out” the best in our young, joining their freshness and energy to the society in which they belong.

In this way, education assumes its true place, as the proving ground for the future, channelling, training, and disciplining youth

and exuberance, providing for our country’s life. In this sense, the things we learn, and the future we hope for, go together.

It is for this reason that education is so often a political football.

Continuing debates about school zoning, socioeconomic disparity, the performance of Māori and Pacific Islanders, boys education, NCEA, and myriad other challenges jostle for our attention.

Underneath these debates, lie real parents, real families, and real social wounds, as well as differing versions of what we value, and what we think will help. There is broad consensus that, while our education system works very well for most, there is a “tail” of underachievement, comprising some of our most disadvantaged, and disconnected kids. Parliament’s Education and Science Committee put it briefly and baldly in 2008, quoting the Education Review Office: “New Zealand’s best students perform with the best in other countries but there is a group at the bottom, perhaps as large as 20 percent, who are currently not succeeding in our education system.”1 The lack of educational opportunity at the “tail” has brutal consequences, represented in crime statistics, social disconnection, health, and economic life. To put it simply: our country cannot afford to leave so many kids out in the cold. Tackling these realities is vital if we are to pass on to the next generation a New Zealand which works for everyone—even and especially those at risk.

John Fox

| 33

New approaches such as Te Kotahitanga, which prioritises a model including Māori culture, emphasis on relationality, and reciprocity, are starting to begin the long process of a turn back to health.2 But the most controversial new approach was launched by the government in 2013: Partnership Schools, or Kura Hourua.

Popularly called “charter schools,” they marry up State money with community sponsors, in an effort to tackle underachievement.

They’re the government’s latest attempt at catching the tail, and even though there are only a handful of them so far (the government have announced 11), they have the potential to do, and to be, beautiful creative work.

In reconnecting, learning, and innovating, they begin the kind of innovation we need to be brave enough to try.

Alwyn Poole reminds me of my old Rugby coach: in fact, in addition to teaching Economics, Maths, and Science, he was one himself.

With his wife Karen, he heads up Villa Education Trust or “VET,” an entity they began with their own money that now runs two Partnership Schools for Years 7-10: South Auckland Middle School (SAMS), and West Auckland Middle School. The model they use was developed in 2003 when they set up Mt Hobson Middle School, a small private school in Auckland. It’s a synthesis of research and “best practice:” low on excuses and what he calls “misplaced sympathy,” high on “engagement,” “work ethic, and care for people.”

Mr Poole takes issue with the division of kids into the “able” and the “not,” and argues that that “any child given expert mentoring and teaching, significant purposeful practice, any kid, can develop

34 | The Things We Learn

extraordinary skills.” While kids who already display high ability require extension and “have to use it or lose it,” he argues that the other, “normal” kids also have to have “expert coaching teaching and mentoring, in a supportive way, which will drive them towards purposeful work.” “Not every child will be the same, but every child can be coached. It might be a particular [area] they develop an interest in.” At these schools, every student has a learning plan, and expectations are high. “Convey that sense of belief in a practical way,” he says, and “extraordinary things happen.” It’s a message that seems to be getting through to the kids we spoke to.

Paris, 14, wants to join the military. She is hoping to go to Vanguard (another Partnership School, for Years 11-13) next year.

She’s wanted to join the military for a while, since her brother tried to, but missed out due to failing grades. The difference, she says, is that she has a goal, and a plan to get there.

Josiah, 15, wants to be a politician. Half Tongan, he has always found school hard. Since joining South Auckland Middle School two years ago, he’s found he can achieve merits, or merits with excellence—something he never thought he was capable of in his last school. “I’ve learnt to work independently,” he says. “I’ve learnt I can rely on myself.”

The teacher quality at VET also comes in for high praise, with one student saying “the teachers here aren’t just teachers. They’re like mothers to us,” and another: “You can go to the teachers about anything, even about stuff at home. They’re not too busy for you.”

That personal touch, and that intensity of focus, is key to the VET approach. That sense of expectation, and that fostering of crucial confidence, makes a huge difference.

The kids have a split work day: intensive conventional classes from 8:30 to 12:50 in five subject areas (English, Maths, Science, Social Studies and Technology), with independent (but supervised) project work, and then the afternoon on sport, music, community service, and the arts. The curriculum is “integrated,” which means that the subject areas, the project work, and the afternoon activities are matched up. “So in Year 7, we do a unit on Architecture. Every project will have every learning area of the New Zealand Curriculum, and we have every strand of New Zealand Curriculum in the learning areas. [And we teach in an] Architecture context. In Maths class: angle geometry, 3D shape. In English, we look at the significant buildings in one major city, so a kid might look at New York: the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, the World Trade Center, its social context and history. Then they do a visual presentation, 10 buildings that they like, with room for individual choice. So we might set them a Maths task to do with a properly symbolised house plan, and the kid is interested in ocean liners. So we change the plan to ocean liner. Sure, as long as it meets the strands…there’s room for individualised learning, freedom in form.” The curriculum combines traditional teaching, technology, and avowedly Christian values, such as Honesty, Compassion, Faith, Integrity, and Courage.

The VET model has smaller class sizes (they’re capped at 15) with an emphasis on engagement. Mr Poole puts it this way: “If [a teacher] gets a smaller class, and says “I can put my feet up,” [the research says there’s] no effect. If you say instead, “I can become a better teacher, I can bring more creativity, I can ask questions and bring the kids forward—a child can’t sit in a classroom and be a back seat customer. They have nowhere to hide. And we don’t want them to hide.”

VET schools also put a premium on family involvement, and on school culture. It works on two principles, Mr Poole explains: “As human beings we have extreme value. And every child has ability that can be developed. We don’t classify children by ability or background.”

“There are some things in their previous life and context we can’t do anything about, but there are many things we can change. Our job is to bring change in their life.”

This is a shared job, Mr Poole argues, between the kids themselves, the school management, and parents. “Parents need to be supportive, facilitative, encouraging. We invite them in. At SAMS we just had a New Parents Evening, and all but one of the new children were represented. We ring them up and say you’re expected to be there.” Uniform and stationery are free, the timetable is simple, and classroom discipline a priority.

Mr Poole is quick to say that many of these good things belong to lots of schools, but he clearly believes in his model, and his staff— welcoming ERO, commissioning his own evaluation, and calling for bracing honesty about the things that don’t work. The freedom of the Kura Hourua model allows kids who—for whatever reason—aren’t getting the quality of education they deserve, especially the “priority learners” at the tail, to come and give a new model of schooling a go:

John Fox

| 35

“New Zealand is fourth in the prosperity index in the world.

New Zealand is second in per capita wealth. There’s no excuse that the NZ European children are first in [the education ranking] PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), and Māori children are 35th. There is no excuse. We should be radically upset about that, on a daily and weekly basis, and any opportunity to bring about change should be grabbed with both hands.”

“We’re a world class education system, but we’re not for Māori and Pacific children. We should be upset about it, it’s a big deal.”

Mr Poole argues that every school should be open to recognising its failures, accountable to its stake-holders, and most of all, focused on the kids. He hopes SAMS might be a very small part of a much bigger change, away from horrific statistics, and towards real hope.

Josiah agrees. When asked why he thinks Pacific and Māori people

are underemployed, he answers, simply. “A lot of older guys I know never experienced the education I am in, so they can’t get a job. No one will give them a break.”

The long term future of Partnership Schools is still under debate.

Critics argue that the schools are overfunded (the Ministry says not),3 unnecessary, unwelcome, unaccountable, and a thousand other things. Evaluation and transparency will be key in putting these concerns to rest. Yet and still, we risk the future of our country when we fail to train, and to inspire our youth. Without them, there is no tomorrow. And without innovators who take the best advice and the best people, and dare to say “forward” in the face of all the odds, we have no future either. The future of our country, and our children, depend on the choices we make—and the courage we have to make them. It’s that vital sense of courage, and that vital investment, we must begin to make now. •

John Fox teaches in the Department of English at the University of Auckland. He is also a volunteer literacy tutor, and a trustee of Elevate, the Christian disability Trust. A former Senior RA in a student Hall of Residence, Venn Foundation lecturer, private tutor and Sunday School teacher, teaching is in his blood, despite happening in large part by serendipity and grace. When not complaining about the Things Wrong With the World, he can sometimes be found trying to fix them.

NOTES: 1 Enquiry into Making the Education System Work for Every Child, Report of the Education and Science Committee, February 2008, 7-11. Available at http://www.parliament.nz/resource/ennz/48DBSCH_SCR3979_1/383847d373839d321e886e1754d8378732ad69e6 (Accessed 5 November 2015).

2 See Bishop, R., et al., Te Kotahitanga: Addressing educational disparities facing Māori students in New Zealand, Teaching and Teacher Education (2009), doi:10.1016/j.tate.2009.01.009, 1-9.

3 State and Partnership Schools Funding: The Facts. Available http://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Ministry/Initiatives/Partnership-schools/StatePartnershipSchoolsFunding.pdf (Accessed 5 November 2015)

36 | The Things We Learn

LEADING

BY EXAMPLE HANNAH BARTLETT

In the face of finite resources and mounting landfill, Timothy Allan wants to change the future, through innovative design that has the end in mind.

Hannah Bartlett

| 37

W

hat goes up must come down; You reap what you sow; If a butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazon…

They’re the cliches of consequence we’re all too familiar with, and yet when it comes to products and to innovation, our measure of impact often doesn’t extend beyond our own front doorstep, or our rubbish bins on the footpath.

But our shortsighted expectations about what a newly-created product should and could be, might not only have negative environmental implications, but could also be hindering the innovative horizons we could be exploring.

It’s quiet, zippy and runs on a battery—not quite what you’d expect from a farm bike.

The two-wheel electric Ubco bike has been developed to be emission-free, lightweight, and sustainable, using materials that can be reused and repurposed, and minimise environmental impact.

It’s been pitched at farmers and tourism operators predominantly, and it’s causing a fair bit of buzz. Debuting at Fieldays 2015, a TVNZ Breakfast reporter filmed herself hooning around on it, and just recently the New Zealand Herald reported acceleration in the bike’s production to meet demand in the North American market.

38 | Leading by Example

But the really interesting story is the one that led to the Ubco bike’s development.

It’s a part of life that’s universally understood—all good things come to an end. For Tim Allan of Locus Research, this isn’t a throwaway statement; it underpins his entire design process. In working with developers and innovators, including those of the Ubco bike, Tim is committed to developing the most effective, efficient, and sustainable products possible—from beginning to end. For Tim, it’s not a case of making trade-offs between sustainability and good design, instead it’s a matter of problem-solving and innovating in such a way to make products that do both.

And while this may seem like an obvious goal for a designer, Tim explains that so often the integrity needed to see this approach through from start to finish is lacking in the leadership of many companies.

But rather than spending his time critiquing others, Tim’s approach is to lead by example. He’s part of an emerging group of New Zealand innovators who want to see a shift in the way we approach product design—to flip the process on its head and think about the end, as well as the beginning, and everything in between.

To plan for the end, and to take responsibility for where a new product will end its life, before it’s even left the design phase.

na n c e

&R

ecycle

Credit: Locus Research

nte

process Re

ibution str

Use & Mai

Packag

ail Ret & Di

fac anu tur

aterial

wM

e&

M

Extracti

e

s&

Raw materials and energy

on

Ra

SYSTEM UNDER ANALYSIS

Environment

Emissions to air, land and water Tim explains by drawing a diagram showing the full life span of a product, including its initial conception, right through to what happens to it when a consumer decides it’s done its dash.

At every point along the way, energy and materials are used as “inputs” and in doing so they produce “outputs.”

Every step has consequences for the environment, and Tim and his team are on a constant mission to mitigate them through innovation. Including what happens when they’re thrown out with the trash.

In other words, it’s a lot more complicated than mere CO2 emissions or the recyclability grade on the end product, which many of the more common environmental management systems used in the sustainability auditing process focus on. Tim and his team believe that products that are sustainable aren’t just better for the environment, they’re better products, full stop.

The Ubco bike is an excellent example of that. Farmers are jumping on board because one of the benefits of an electric bike is that it’s quiet, which as it happens, makes it far more practical than its noisy, gas-guzzling counterparts when it comes to herding stock.

The choice of sustainable materials also makes it lightweight, for easier manoeuvrability, and being a two-wheeler, it’s a lot safer than the likes of the notorious quad bike.

In order to find the sweet-spot between smooth design and environmental cost when developing a product like the bike, the Locus Research team identify what the “functional unit” of a product is. In other words, what does this thing actually need to do? Tim says that by reducing something to it’s core function, you’re no longer confined to a preconceived idea about what the product looks like or how it fits together, but focus instead on what it needs to achieve.

And as they begin to work through that, the team refuses to forge ahead with any stage of production without considering its impact on the environment.

This is because Tim is acutely aware that everything has an impact. He says any company that claims to be perfect is lying.

While nature has an auto-correct function in all its processes, humans often fail to measure the impact of the deeply rooted processes they have developed, and take a lot for granted. Especially when no one’s watching.

At Locus, they work with a model that looks at eight top-level impact categories used to identify the toxicity and environmental impact of a product, from the impacts of chemicals and toxins on humans, through to carbon emissions. Their level of detail and attention to improvement in this area goes beyond the common approach to environment management systems, including the “ISO 14001” standard adopted by many companies, which Tim says allows organisations to pick and choose which categories they will focus on improving.

It’s this attention and understanding of the opportunities presented in each stage of the life cycle that sets Tim’s approach apart, and give his products an innovative edge.

These constraints force creativity and as Tim says, “when you run a business holistically, it’s not surprising that it works out better for all concerned.”

It’s an understatement to say he’s cautious about companies who adopt environmental policy or procedure that sits on the surface—primarily serving a public relations function. “The way that people often discuss sustainability, it’s often not in the perspective that it’s the right thing to do. Either it has to save money, or it’s a PR thing.” Tim maintains that “it’s the right thing to do” so companies should “just do it.”

Tim laments when companies have some good initiatives, but don’t have a holistic approach and commitment to do things right, all the time. This is especially true when it comes to end-of-life management. He says some of the largest manufacturers in the world, especially of technology, trace as little as 5% of where their products end up.

In New Zealand, people can throw a cellphone, battery or even a laptop in the rubbish and not be fined or held accountable for it.

Hannah Bartlett

| 39

With some of the world’s most valuable resources contained in the electrical technology that is so blithely thrown away, Tim says there are wasted opportunities for them to be reused, rather than ending up seeping toxins into a landfill. He says companies often have the resources to find creative solutions, but there is no will or pressure to do so.

“It’s a little bit like running an overdraft, we’re all spending the money and we’re accumulating all this stuff, but it actually has to go somewhere,” says Tim.

In other words, everything has a cost, and someone, somewhere will have to pay it.

Just as spending up large on a credit card for short term gain only leads to heartache later on, so too does creating products with no contingency plan as to what problems their existence might create for future generations, leaving them with an inherited debt of environmental cost.

Passing the buck doesn’t help either, with offshore rubbish heaps, third world “recycling” dumps, and floating rubbish islands, the stuff of nightmares come about due to a lack of global regulation.

For this reason, Tim says legislation is needed to ensure companies take responsibility for their products’ disposal. “With end-of-life, you need political force. Leadership will change everything. It will give [companies] permission to change things.

The danger of just a voluntary code of sorts is that you’ll always have those who will continue to take short cuts and produce poor quality, unsustainable products.”

40 | Leading by Example

Introducing legislation around end-of-life, as has been done in Europe and Australia, levels the playing field for all companies and ensures some don’t cut corners. It sets up the framework and makes it a priority, giving developers working in product innovation the impetus and mandate to ensure it’s a priority built into their design from the get-go.

“If you like New Zealand and you like the way it is, then you need to take responsibility for the things you do, whether you’re a business or an individual.”

The worst thing people can do is throw their hands up and think it’s all too hard, says Tim. “When you sit around and just talk about the problem, that is the problem.”

For too long our collective approach to environmental sustainablity has been about describing the problems, and making excuses. Instead, those who share a “just do it” philosophy are calling on people in all areas of society to be intentional about what they do. Whether it’s creating a better product, just because its better, or taking time to responsibly dispose of an unwanted good; not because you have to, but because it’s the right thing to do.

While Tim Allan waits for legislation to catch up and to enforce collective responsibility, he and others like him are calling on New Zealanders to do their bit. To remember that no action is without consequence, and that we all play our part in the cycle. •

RECYCLING: WHAT REALLY HAPPENS TO OUR TRASH? Every year, New Zealanders send 80,000 tonnes of electronic waste into landfill, part of the tower of rubbish we create annually: if collected in one place it would create a 360 story skyscraper with a footprint the size of a rugby field.

Experts tell us that half of this towering mess could be recycled or composted, a worthy challenge. But with no central recycling

programme, and council collections that vary in type and frequency, how do we effectively and safely dispose of our household waste with certainty that we’re doing the right thing?

Here’s a roundup of some common household products that can be a dilemma to dispose of properly:

BATTERIES

COMPUTERS

• Use rechargeable batteries whenever possible.

• There are plenty of great computer recyclers around New Zealand; places that allow you to drop off old computer equipment for no charge. Some, like Molten in Christchurch, take old computers and reuse their valuable innards to construct computers for schools and community efforts. Others sell the material to overseas recyclers who can handle the processing of e-waste in compliance with the Basel Convention.

• Normal alkaline batteries don’t contain any valuable materials, so there is no industry that pays for them to be recycled.

• Previously some council and retailer programmes collected batteries and encased them in concrete for burial, to prevent toxic waste seeping into the ground. Most have finished this service, but some are still going in limited locations.

• Experts we spoke to from several organisations said that until a centralised disposal option becomes available, the most responsible thing to do (if your council doesn’t offer a disposal service) is to dispose of batteries one at a time in different rubbish bags, to avoid concentration of toxic material.

• The easiest way to find a free drop off point near you, is to do an internet search for “free computer recycling (name of city/region).”

Many electronics retailers will also accept your computer for recycling, especially as a trade in.

PHONES

PLASTICS

• Extremely toxic metals go into making our phones as smart as they are. These materials decompose when chucked into landfill, forming poisonous liquids that can seep into soil and groundwater, and on into our water supply and food.

• Do take the time to rinse. When you put dirty plastic into the recycling, you contribute to making the recycling process more expensive, due to the inefficiencies involved in removing organic waste.

• 90% of a phone’s materials can be reused. Every phone that’s recycled properly can become a source of heavy metals for industry, eliminating the need to mine for the equivalent substances.

• Plastic from local recycling collection is mainly sent to Australia, China and Southeast Asia, where they are turned into buckets, carpets, wheelie bins, and polar fleece jerseys; pretty much any product that can be made with plastic.

• In New Zealand, you can recycle any unwanted mobile phones and accessories in the RE:MOBILE bins in any Vodafone, Spark or 2Degrees store, or through the mail to the Starship Mobile Phone Appeal. The earlier you recycle your old phone, the more likely it is that the parts will be useful for recycling, so don’t leave them lying in a drawer.

• We don’t have the volume of plastic recycling necessary to sustain a profitable local plastic processing industry in New Zealand. This is why we send most of our plastic overseas to places that have manufacturing industries which can use the reclaimed materials that come from recycled plastics.

Hannah Bartlett

| 41

THE LITTLE TOWN THAT COULD DALE WILLIAMS

Small towns face a fight for survival. How can these close knit communities retain the next generation in the face of the bright lights and big opportunities here and overseas? In Otorohanga, Dale Williams found a way.

42 | The Little Town That Could

M

y journey began 54 years ago in a small rural community.

School was uneventful for me, a frustrating place that couldn’t compete with my desire to be in work, fixing things.

I just wanted to be a mechanic, with the feel of tools in my hands; not books. Mr Spencer will tell you I left by “mutual agreement,” and for once, I wouldn’t disagree with him.

At the age of 17 I began a motorcycle engineering apprenticeship, and at age 23, in a little town called Otorohanga, I realised my dream of establishing a motorcycle dealership. With my own business I had responsibilities and freedom, an experience I was able to share with many young people who were almost exactly like me. I employed kids who had performed poorly at school but were creative and practical; assets to my businesses.

If you’d told me then I would serve three terms on Council, before being elected Mayor of the Otorohanga District in 2004, a position I would hold for 9 years, I would have laughed you out of town. And yet looking back, it was purely my passion and belief in my town and our community’s potential that lead to my unexpected career turn.

As Mayor I was immediately confronted with obvious and pressing challenges. Within weeks of being sworn in, multiple significant local businesses came to me saying they were considering relocation due to lack of suitable staff. Tragically within the first few weeks, our community also lost two young men to suicide. When I met with their friends and families they told me that young people in Otorohanga were disillusioned by the lack of work opportunities in the district: there was “nothing here for them.” Through further investigation I met young apprentices who were eight years into a four year apprenticeship, and I saw the local high school careers advisor who had no connection to employers, and said he “didn’t even like young people.”

I began to think about my own story, and how our community could do better at building a future for these young people.

When I left school I knew I wanted to be a mechanic, because I had the opportunity to work in local garages throughout the school holidays. Fast forward to today, too few employers offer after school jobs, or work experience opportunities. It’s easier to hide behind OSH regulations or being “too busy.” So then, how does a young person know how to be reliable, disciplined, and productive in their new job if they’ve never been in a workplace?

My apprenticeship was gained largely due to my father’s influence and support. Today, many young people don’t have an active father in their lives, or friends and family able to make important connections.

When I began work, we were placed under the care and protection of an older experienced tradesman, learning the job at a pace we could cope with. Today however, workplaces are often frantic, stressful, without extra capacity to support young staff. They can be very

frightening places for a young person straight out of school.

It doesn’t end there. Traditionally we take a young person, provide them the best education available, and cross our fingers for a job. The most well-lit and well funded pathway throughout secondary education is the progression to tertiary and higher education, yet statistically this works for less than 50% of school leavers, regardless of decile. If this prescription isn’t turning out how we want or hope, we all have to think more creatively.

From my experience I advise students: “if the career path you choose requires a degree, get one, that’s logical. But a degree will not necessarily make you more employable.” Qualifications are one aspect, but confidence, practical skills, attitude, experience, time management, and having your drivers licence and first aid certificate count too. The Government calls them “Employability Skills and Work Readiness Attributes.” My Dad would have called them “the basics.”

People say our young are lazy, and badly motivated. I think that’s nonsense. Our young people have not lost the ‘work ethic’ my generation believes it was born with, and it’s frustrating to hear people who should know better disparage the younger generation as less committed, willing, or able to work—what nonsense!

I have never met a young person who doesn’t want to work—earn their own money, provide for their family, and have the mana of being self sufficient.

But I have met many who don’t know what work is, and that is the heart of the issue.

New Zealanders have a well deserved international reputation as friendly, hard working, with a great attitude and a broad range of skills. There’s no reason we can’t use the energy and drive of our young people to build their future. Work skills can’t all be taught in a classroom, yet communities rely almost entirely on schools to prepare students to be work ready. This is unrealistic and unfair on educators.

There needs to be more meaningful and long-term partnerships with industry and employers, to take advantage of the tools many schools now offer, including Gateway, Trades Academies, Vocational Pathways. These provide excellent opportunities for students to become familiar and confident in the workplace, and proud of their trade, the same way I am proud to be an ex-mechanic.

It intrigues me that while businesses budget for vehicles, IT, marketing, premises, and equipment, not many will commit significant investment to future staff requirements—even fewer employers can actually name their local school’s Gateway Co-ordinator or Careers Advisor. Industry itself stands to gain significantly by more effective partnerships, from well educated, prepared, and skilled young people entering their workplaces.

But it doesn’t stop there. Put bluntly, if the young person misses out, so will the community. Young people have options. With the

Dale Williams | 43

click of a mouse they can be anywhere in the world—meaningfully employed, well paid, with a choice of benefits and perks, in exciting locations, and most significantly, appreciated and valued.

Further still, global populations are rapidly aging. The real threat however, is not so much from more elderly, but fewer young.

Population graphs of our major trading partners look like Halley’s Comet. Huge population bubbles of those over 50 taper away to very, very few young people and children.

Over the next 15-25 years, hundreds of millions of people worldwide will exit workplaces—the question is who will fill their vacancies in the main street of towns like Otorohanga?

And think, if it’s challenging to engage, attract, and retain the ideal young employee today, you can guarantee it will be much harder in future.

We are currently doing a disservice to thousands of young people who will one day be our teachers, tax-payers, Mayors, and mechanics. But this issue is no longer just about doing better for our young people, this is about our communities’ economic sustainability. The unavoidable and impending global demographic urgency makes this is now an issue of national importance.

44 | The Little Town That Could

We have to re-think how we treat our young people, instead of writing them off we must invest in them, partner-up, collaborate, and make sure that our businesses, families, industries, and communities truly are sustainable.

My story and experience helped me lead Otorohanga through creating and implementing a suite of initiatives that tackled this stuff.

We took responsibility for the transition phase between school and work: partnering with local business to bring a training institution into town, co-ordinating training for young people in skills that were needed in the local economy while providing mentoring programmes and supporting them into apprenticeships and jobs.

We don’t always need to look overseas for ideas and inspiration, sometimes it’s literally in our backyard, or in this case 53 kilometres south of Hamilton and 18 kilometres north of Te Kuiti. I think that communities like Otorohanga everywhere can step-up, exercise leadership, and take ownership of the connection between jobs and education. Generally communities measure supply and have sufficient resources (including money), but few accurately understand local demand. In Otorohanga, we brought local knowledge and leadership together to create something better for our kids.

Results for our town were immediate, impressive, and well documented, and boy did we celebrate! In 2004 our registered youth unemployment was around 12-14%; this plummeted to zero by 2007.

In the same period we saw a 75% reduction in youth crime, and apprenticeship completion rates skyrocketed to 96-100% compared to the national average of less than 40%—all within two years. Our strategy was simple, we gathered together to share ideas and coordinate three key areas: supply of potential job seekers; resources of providers; and trainers and expertise and demand in in the local job market. Since then I’ve had the opportunity to help other communities find their own solutions; working “@ the COALface,” supporting communities and their leaders develop initiatives based on Community Ownership And Leadership (COAL).

Because the longer a community allows itself to believe that they would be a better place if only the Government/the Council/somebody else did more, gave more, stopped doing … the less sustainable that community will become.

Truth is, communities already have the essentials to revive.

We make a mistake in blaming young people for much that is not their fault. If we put our heads together, we’ll always find better fits and better connections between job opportunities and education.

In Māori, Otorohanga means “food for a long journey”—to young people the meaning found in a job can literally provide food for life.

If we pay more attention to the resources local people already have, the energy, passion, and drive they possess, and marry that up with practical wisdom that gets things done, we have a shot at a better future. Our small towns are more than holding pens, or also-rans.

They are the hope for a sustainable and really connected future. I believe that’s worth fighting for. •

A motorcycle mechanic by trade, Dale’s years of involvement in local politics kicked off when he was elected to the Otorohanga Community Board and District Council in 1995. Elected as Mayor of Otorohanga in 2004, Dale’s innovation and passion for his town and district led to an incredible improvement in youth engagement, employment, achievement, and even youth crime statistics. He now chairs the Mayors Taskforce for Jobs, expanding the mantra “zero waste of young people” across New Zealand.

Dale Williams | 45

SUGGESTED READS

Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things

by Michael Braungart and William McDonough

The Beautiful Tree: A personal journey into how the world’s poorest people are educating themselves

By James Tooley

Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature

By Janine Benyus

Green Philosophy: How To Think Seriously About The Planet

By Roger Scruton

46 | The Little Town That Could

Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest To Change Harlem And America

By Paul Tough Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if people mattered

By Ernst F. Schumacher

LOOK THEM UP Wetland Solutions wetland.co.nz Find out more about the logistics of recreating a wetland. Featuring photos of other wetland projects around New Zealand and details of community initiatives.

Able Products ableproducts.co.nz “Able” is a line of cleaning products made in New Zealand, bottled and packaged by Altus Enterprises, supporting their work providing employment opportunities to people with disabilities. Purchasing online allows you to nominate another charity, which will receive 5% of your spend.

The Waste Exchange nothrow.co.nz A website that bills itself as “an online tool designed to help businesses, organisations and people find markets for by-products, surplus materials and resources. Through Nothrow, people who have unwanted materials can find alternative pathways to landfill for their materials through connecting with organisations and people who are able to reuse their unwanted materials.”

Native Planet – preserving cultures, empowering people nativeplanet.org

World Business Council for Sustainable Development wbcsd.org

An NGO set up to help indigenous peoples preserve their unique cultures and ways of caring for nature. Documentaries, information on cultural tourism and photo galleries that provide a window to the huge diversity of human experience around the world.

A CEO-led organisation of forward thinking companies that galvanises the global business community to create a sustainable future for business, society and the environment.

The Saw Pit thesawpit.co.nz

An Irish movement of ordinary people based throughout the country who have joined together to do something positive and innovative to address the paired issues of unemployment and involuntary emigration away from their hometown.

A small company keeping traditional handcrafted woodworking methods alive, The Saw Pit isn’t your average furniture store; mass-producing to the latest trends. Using recycled timber to create objects that will last the test of time, they are committed to combining the best of art and commerce to produce work that is truly sustainable.

Plastics NZ plastics.org.nz Website for New Zealand’s plastics industry.

Good stats and more info on how to recycle plastic smarter under the ‘Environment’ tab.

Communities Creating Jobs ccj.ie

99% Invisible 99percentinvisible.org This podcast by Roman Mars takes a weekly look into the “99% invisible” activity of designers, architects, and innovators that make the decisions about the products, spaces, words, and structures that surround us every day.

Dale Williams | 47

Whatungarongaro te tangata toitū te whenua As man disappears from sight, the land remains.

– MĀORI PROVERB

flintandsteelmag.com