Regenerative Environmental Pioneer

[Applause]

people come and go

but only the land shall remain

the irony of that whakatauki is that due

to soil erosion

we’re losing the land even faster than

the people

i was asked recently what would the

mountain say if the mountain could speak

i paused for a moment and i thought what

would she say

i think she’d tell us to piss off i

think she would say

i’ve lived through ice ages i’ve had

dinosaurs roam across the puku of my

whenua

i’ve seen fires and i’ve seen floods and

i’ve seen droughts

and yes i have seen tsunamis

but i have never ever in my entire

existence

seen anything as willfully destructive

as you lot

you people so henceforth be gone

you vile creatures back to the place

from whence you came

but first of all pick up your rubbish

your plastic and your pesticides your

rats and your cats

your insects and your weeds muster lids

and possums

and i will once again regenerate the

body of my whenua

using my plants and insects lizards and

birds

to recreate the vast forests the forests

that once protected my rivers

so that fresh water can again flow to

the oceans

the oceans they sustain all of us

the truth is the mountain can talk and

has been talking

but we’ve been so consumed by the

minutiae of our everyday lives

that we fail to take notice that

us until covert 19 stopped us in our

tracks

then all of a sudden all around the

world people paused

started to observe the natural

environment around them

it was as if out of clean air

or at least non-polluted here we could

see mountainsides

on the horizon there were stars visible

in the skies

and there were birds in our backyards

they could sing

like they’re just falling from the sky

like mana from heaven

waiting for a pause in the traffic and

the pollution

to suddenly reappear in our lives fact

is they were there the whole time

we had just failed to take notice

87 percent of our population live in

urban areas

yet they are almost completely

disconnected from the natural

environment

clover 19 has shown us and the world

that we can change our behavior when we

want to but that generally we choose not

to

doing nothing is no longer acceptable

the environment deserves the same

intensive care that we have shown in our

response to covert 19.

the status quo is totally unacceptable

as president roosevelt said our

generation

is on a rendezvous with destiny

it is up to us in this moment in time

both individually and collectively to

make long-term sustainable change

for the environment and the economy

and it is the environment before the

economy we can no longer afford to pay

lip service to the environment

avatar or new zealand an isolated island

in the southwest pacific ocean

with a vibrant outward-looking

indigenous culture

if we cannot lead the way then who else

will

now you’re probably wondering who the

heck is this panifero pakiha

to have the temerity to talk to us about

the environment

well i’m a farmer and i live and i

breathe in the outside

environment day in day out rain

hail sunshine flood drought

i rely upon her to produce the healthy

natural food

that you take for granted if i cannot

produce food

you don’t eat we need to care for her

like our mother and our grandmothers

nurture her like our daughters

and our granddaughters

now i’m going to back it up here and

give you an idea of how

and why i’ve turned out to be the way i

am

people arrived here in the early 1840s

1842 duchess of fargo to be precise

that escaped the highland clearances and

ironically

the cholera epidemic they arrived with

very little apart from the family

like all early settlers were entirely

dependent

upon the kindness the good will

and the protection of iwi maori

they learned to speak the language and

the customs

and formed long and enduring

relationships

so much so that by the 1850s the

teenagers

the boys were deemed old enough to be

able to travel on horseback over a

thousand kilometres right across the

island in order to buy cattle for the

auckland market

now this could have only been achieved

with the goodwill

generosity kindness and protection of

iwi maori

and in fact we have a saying in our

family not a mere

it was only because of the kindness

the good will and protection of very

maori that the mural whanau are still

here today

and we’re still farming the same land

next to the same whanau that we met

those many many generations ago under

the korowai of waikato

the changes that these old people were

seeing on the land and its

people had a profound effect upon them

even more so

after land wars of the 1860s and the

subsequent

confiscations

i was extremely privileged growing up

around many many elders

both maori and pakiha and it was from

them that i gained knowledge of what

life had been like

for the many generations before our time

they had grown up in an age of using a

horse and plowed to seeing people

landing on the moon

it was almost as if as we improved in

our technological well-being

our relationship to the land and the

environment

deteriorated at an almost equivalent

rate became survival

in the economy first

the stream at the back of our farm

pre-1860 was like state highway one for

for taiwanese maori tens of thousands of

tons of produce

from the flour mills their flax mills

the orchards in the market gardens would

pass through there on the way

to supply auckland and the sydney

markets even as far as the californian

gold rushes

the elders used to talk to me about the

abundance

of our forests our rivers

our lakes and oceans in fact they used

to catch

so much white bait they would use the

surplus as fertilizer for their garden

which i know in today’s reality is a

complete sacrilege but that’s

what the times were my reality did not

reflect this

now we jump to the present day

now our total new zealand is becoming

world famous

in terms of irreversible soil erosion

scientists from japan britain france

and america are studying the east cape

of new zealand to thai rafiti

it is estimated that in one catchment

alone 35 million

tons of silt is being eroded down our

rivers and out to sea

every year it’s already raised the river

by up to 20 meters that’s kakite fenuwa

not even kakita no there is no ano there

is no again

once it is gone it is gone

so what to do i could see

what had happened in my area and i

wasn’t willing to wait

for another generation to fix the

problems of the past

the accumulative effect of what was

happening back here in the east cape

was like a massive oil slip coming down

our rivers into our oceans

but the difference being is that when

there’s an oil slick our nation goes

into overdrive to fix it

when the soil erosion in the back blocks

no one apart from the locals

who rely upon the land the river and the

sea

no one gives a damn here’s an analogy

you might be able to relate to

say you’ve been out on the lawn having a

few wines you go home but you’ve

forgotten to take in the blanket

you come back a couple of days later

you’re fully recovered

you pick up the blanket and holy heck

what is this

everything is dead all of the plants

and all of the organisms that rely upon

that have been starved of life

the same thing is happening to our

rivers and our oceans

too much sediment no light no plant life

no fish near series no power

crayfish nothing just barren rocks

so what to do like i said i could see

what had happened in my

area and i was not willing or prepared

to wait for another generation to fix

that problem

i decided to start in my own backyard

a once vibrant stream

that had been the lifeblood tetanui

maori was now

a stagnant fettered swamp choked

by willows and invasive plants

i decided to do my own regeneration in

my own backyard

now gandhi said four phases to starting

a pioneering movement

first they ignore you it’s fine with

that i’m a farmer i just want to get

stuck in and get the job done with no

undue attention

secondly they laugh at you

by the time they realize that i’m

laughing at them laughing at me we get

to the third phase

and that’s where they want to fight you

everything in the animal kingdom knows

not to provoke or antagonize a brightly

coloured object

a red-headed farmer in the middle of the

swamp with the chainsaws by

no means an exception

then after that they want to join join

you and that’s

where you get the ripple effect

by now it was obvious in a major

transformation had taken place

the plants and the weeds that were

blocking the river had gone

the river was flowing again

the natural flora and fauna was

reviving people could see

that it was no longer pointless

worthless or impossible it resonated

with them

and their way of life and their

connection to the river

and they wanted to be part of that

community they could see the benefit

for the children’s children’s children

by me cleaning up my backyard it had a

positive effect on their backyard

intergenerational sustainable

environmental

change so in summary in 2011

i got funding from the waikato river

authority

as part of the tainui treaty settlement

process in order to

improve the health and the well-being of

the waikato river

so with the chainsaw and digger

i started clearing kilometres of the

stream removed thousands of willows that

were blocking it

planted tens of thousands of trees

created dozens of white bait spawning

ponds started a pest control

program on all of the islands of the

waikato river delta

and finally building this boardwalk you

might think what’s up with the boardwalk

why would you

build the boardwalk wow if you want

intergenerational sustainable

environmental change

we have to start with our young people

they need to experience it to see that

river flowing

watch the fish coming in hear the birds

listen to the rattle of the harakiki and

the ropo in the swamp

then they connect to it it has meaning

and it resonates with them and they gain

ownership

that’s how you get into generational

sustainable environmental change

but where to where to from here

87 percent of our population live in

urban areas

international studies have shown a

direct correlation between our mental

and a physical wellbeing and our

connection to nature

now our child all new zealand is also

world famous not just in pest

eradication

but also in returning the flora and

fauna of endangered species

hitherto on offshore islands but now on

the mainland we want to bring it right

back into your backyard

and as chairs of the endangered species

foundation of aotearoa new zealand

i pledge to build upon the success of

our rural and our urban communities

not just in eradicating pests but

actually repopulating these landscapes

with the rarest of the rare

if we can empower our communities our

ewes

our kura our schools to play their role

in the restoration

of the more than four and a half

thousand endangered species in our tower

or new zealand

currently for example

there’s estimated to be less than 100

mature kaka big

trees left in the world yet most of us

can remember them growing in our

grandparents backyards

by empowering our communities and our

ewe and our schools

to come up with their own projects using

a combination of traditional knowledge

and modern technology we can provide

hope

we can provide a solution sorry in the

absence of hope

our communities nurturing nature

if i can do it in my backyard okay it is

slightly larger than most people’s

backyards

you can do it in your backyard no matter

how big or how small

it will make a difference at a time when

the mountain is calling us

it is time for us to heed her

with your basket and my basket combined

the people

and the environment can be sustained

thank you