Our LAST best chance

• Published date: 14 May 2022
• Publication title: Mix, The

Grimness is a mis-nomer for this haven of hope in action

From the office porch of 121 Grimness St, in the historic coastal Otago settlement of Karitane, many things catch the eye and spirit on this late-autumn morning at the headquarters of Kati Huirapa Runaka ki Puketeraki.

The expansive, lush, green lawn edged by wooden buildings, shrubs and trees imbues the whole one acre, former school property, with a sense of sanctuary.

Double-hulled waka, half hidden by tarpaulin, speak to the community’s deep connection to this coastline and its active efforts to pass that on to the next generation.

The past is also present through a 4m-tall portrait of departed kaumatua Hoani Matiu, his thoughtful face painted large on what was once a school hall. The late authority on southern Maori traditions watches over those who are quietly busy in the native plant nursery and community vegetable garden propagating seedlings, harvesting vegetables for runaka seniors and weeding young trees awaiting transport to one or other of several planting projects stretching from the nearby Waikouaiti sandspit to farmland in the Maniototo hinterland.

A man stands on the doorstep of what, at a guess, was once the school library.

He is marine ecologist Prof Chris Hepburn, runaka manager Suzanne Ellison says.

There has been a long, collaborative association between the University of Otago’s Department of Marine Sciences and the hapu authority, Ellison says.

Today, Prof Hepburn is here with visiting seaweed farmers from Namibia, southwest Africa. For the runaka, it is part of ongoing planning for climate change adaptation.

‘‘If there is going to be different sorts of farming going on in the marine environment, how do we feel about that?’’ Ellison says, explaining the potential-laden process runaka leaders are working through.

‘‘Where do we want to be positioned in relation to that?’’

Grimness might not fit here, but it seems an apt moniker for the world beyond.

This week, temperatures in Pakistan and India have hovered close to a life-threatening 50degC, the highest on record for the sub-continent. It is the latest in almost a century of climate change observations that have included countless scientific papers, increasingly frequent and violent natural disasters and an unending cycle of global summits end-noted by ineffectual emission target pledges and ever-more dire warnings of climate catastrophe.

New Zealand, of course, has not been immune.

Winters are becoming warmer, glaciers are disappearing, ski seasons are getting shorter.

Rising sea temperatures have seen North Island kingfish chasing kahawai in the waters off Karitane and even in Otago Harbour.

Once-in-a-hundred-year floods and droughts now happen somewhere...