Keep NZ Beautiful reveals winners

• Published date: 23 February 2022
• Publication title: West Coast Messenger, The

Run annually since 1972 the Beautiful Awards are New Zealand's longest-running sustainability awards and provide a benchmark for environmental excellence in New Zealand. They inspire, recognise and acknowledge those individuals, schools, community groups, towns and cities working passionately across the country to Keep New Zealand Beautiful

Keep New Zealand Beautiful CEO Heather Saunderson says: "We've been impressed with the quality of submissions to the Beautiful Awards, and the efforts and passion behind them.

"It's been a tough year for community groups, councils and individuals alike, but their collective commitments to the environment haven't wavered people are doing so much with limited resources, to keep their communities beautiful," said Ms Saunderson. "Through the Beautiful Awards we're pleased to be able to celebrate the efforts made by community groups, schools councils and individuals who are striving to improve New Zealand's environment and thereby the quality of life in our rural communities, urban towns and cities."

Towns and Cities Awards

Judged by Ms Saunderson and Business Desk's head of lifestyle and features Jacqui Loates-Haver this category of the Beautiful Awards recognises and celebrates beautiful towns, cities and regions across New Zealand and acknowledges the positive sustainability and climate change actions that have been taken by councils and communities over the last 12 months, to protect and enhance their local environments.

These prestigious awards review initiatives such as litter prevention, waste minimisation, community beautification and recycling projects, as wells as sustainable tourism initiatives.

Whilst all of the finalists demonstrated significant achievements in the sustainability space, the winners of the Towns and Cities Awards illustrated an exceptionally strong community spirit and have created an environment that other towns and cities would aspire to.

Each award is divided into urban area populations, which are statistically defined and are classified by the size of their resident population.

Most Beautiful Small Town (defined as a small urban area 1000 to 9999 residents)

The finalists for the Most Beautiful Small Town Award were: Foxton

Kaitaia

The winner of this award is Kaitaia.

Key highlights: The Kaitaia community and council worked together to procure $7 million in funding towards environmental restoration initiatives. The community partnered with an enthusiastic council to manage the projects...