January 08, 2019
Tuwharetoa trust on tourism raft
Ngati Tuwharetoa’s Lake Rotoaira Forest Trust has entered the tourism sector with a joint venture with Rafting New Zealand.
The investment will enable the Turangi-based company, which operates on the Tongariro and Waikato rivers, to more than double in size, catering for an expected 30,000 visitors by 2022.
Trust spokesperson Tiwana Tibble says the partnership also aligns with the hapu’s goal of having a Maori owned enterprise operating on the Tongariro River, which feeds into the southern end of Lake Taupo.
"Trees, trout and tourism are what we call the three ‘Ts’ which will form a significant part of Lake Rotoaira Forest Trust’s future business strategy," he says.
"The river connects two significant taonga of Tuwharetoa, being the Tongariro National Park and Lake Taupo.'
Luke Boddington, who founded Rafting NZ 30 years ago with his wife Pianika, says they want to give visitors a customers a true sense of New Zealand’s landscape along with its Maori heritage and culture.
He says the investment should allow the company to take on another 40 staff over the next three years.
The company puts 1 percent of sales revenue into its Awa Toa Fund, which it set up to preserve lakes, rivers and streams for future generations.
The fund is used to provide local Tuwharetoa with training, qualification and employment, to plant native trees along the banks of the Tongariro River, and to help maintain the natural environment of the whio or whistling blue duck, one of New Zealand's rarest animals.
Lake Rotoaira Forest Trust alongside the Lake Taupo Forest Trust manages a sustainable commercial pine forest of 30,000 hectares to the north of Tongariro National Park and east of Lake Taupo, making it the largest NZ owned commercial forest in the country with a combined balance sheet of $400m.
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