June 14, 2024
Wairoa iwi grow horticulture talent
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Tātau Tātau o Te Wairoa is celebrating its first crop of horticulture cadets,
Chair Leon Symes says the post-settlement trust want to encourage alternatives to the region’s reliance on sheep and beef.
The five graduates completed their level 3 horticulture certification while working on orchards.
Mr Symes says they wanted a physical job to do with the whenua, and didn’t see themselves working for Wairoa’s largest employer, the Affco meat processing plant.
“That’s kind of what drives them a lot of the time is to get out, see our whenua, be involved in development of and watching something from their hands, from their mahi grow from nothing into what it is now,” he says.
The five graduates now have management roles within the trust’s Whakapau and Tara orchards and Mr Symes expects them to be the backbone of Wairoa’s horticulture drive.