Kaeo

The bus in kaeoWe've travelled the country from Bluff to Northland looking for stories and talking to people about the need for action and why taking action is important.

It's difficult sometimes. Talk of climate change can become abstract - especially in the cites where environmental subtleties and the forces of nature are less apparent - but today in Kaeo we came face to face with raw human pain and suffering caused by global warming. Sure, we all know that on some level that the modern lives we lead come at a cost but what is the cost and who will pay?

It's hard to quantify but today we visited the Te Huia Marae and talked with the people of Ngati Kahu about price they have paid.

In the past year they have weathered two devastating storms. One was described as a 'one in a 100 year storm' and the other a 'one in a 150 year storm'. Something's wrong there.

Te Huia MaraeHuge deluges of rain in the Northland hills turned normally peaceful creeks and rivers into angry raging torrents that swept through houses, marae, businesses and farms alike leaving destruction in their wake. Homes were destroyed, businesses and livelihoods where lost. Helen Clark's suggestion that they move the town was at best unhelpful.

It's left people in a state of shock but worse than that is the sense of powerlessness borne out of knowing that it could happen again with the next big rainfall. While we've been here we've seen heavy rain and we've seen the rivers swollen with dirty brown water. Thankfully the rain eased and the rivers are dropping but there is a feeling that it is only a matter of time before it happens again.

Bryce Smith: Bryce Smith at Te Huia MaraeBryce Smith of Ngati Kahu put it like this. "Now when we see the black cloud over the hills the whole town goes into anxiety mode. Is this going to be another storm like the last one… or worse?"

Bryce owns a fish & chip shop in the main street of Kaeo. When the last storm came he was only just moving his furniture back into the house after it was flooded in the one before. He and his family were in the shop when the flood waters hit and were forced to wait it out for 14 hours standing in knee deep water. The water in the street outside was moving too fast to risk escape.

It's obviously painful for Bryce and the others to talk of the floods and the damage they've caused. Bryce drew an analogy between his feelings for what happened to the community and the death of a loved one.

The Otangaroa and Mangawhero Marae were both virtually destroyed and have yet to recover. A kaumatua from the Mangawhero marae died a month or so after the floods and they had no marae to take him to.

It's impossible to identify a single cause for any given storm but one thing is for sure.
There has always been rain in Northland and there have always been floods but the people who have lived here all their lives know that it's getting worse.

Climate change will bring increasingly severe weather and some people are beginning to experience that first hand. It's a complicated picture though. The storms are getting worse but the effects of the storms are in turn being exacerbated by other factors.

On one side of Kaeo there is clear felling of pine plantations and on the other is oyster farming in the harbour. The forestry is both increasing the run off of heavy rainfall and causing soil to wash down the rivers. This combined with the oyster farms plugging the natural flow of flood water into the sea means Kaeo and surrounding areas are being submerged on an increasingly regular basis.

The people of Ngati Kahu asked that the forestry be done on a sustainable basis instead of clear-felled and they argued against the oyster farming. They said both these things will result in flooding but their voice fell on deaf ears. The clear felling continues and the oyster farm went ahead.

Te Huia Marae: Some of the Be The Change bus crew with the people of Te Huia MaraeWhat struck me in Kaeo is that we talk of taking action, of preventing the effects of climate change but when a community is hit by floods such as these, energy efficiency and other preventative measures take a back seat. Survival becomes the main concern.

Kaeo is a small place and to some it is perhaps insignificant but it is places like this that signal a warning to us all. It's not only Kaeo that is feeling the effects of climate change. We've had severe flooding and droughts in many parts of NZ. There will come a time if we do not act soon, and with some unity, when we may all find ourselves fighting the flood waters and unable to concentrate on prevention.

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