Ingrid Collins has been made a Dame of the New Zealand Order of Merit after being named in the New Year Honours List. Photo / Matai O'Connor
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Gisborne local Nea (Ingrid) Collins was shocked to find out she had been named a Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to Māori, business and health governance.
When Collins, 79, received the New Year Honours List news that she had been nominated to become a dame, her first thought was confusion.
“Me? A dame? What am I being a dame for?” she asked.
Many others would not question it at all.
Collins, of Ngāti Konohi descent, has contributed 50 years of governance to Whāngārā B5 Incorporation and was appointed as a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2007 for services to Māori.
Collins has been the chair of the Whāngārā Farms partnership since its inception in 2006.
It is regarded as an exemplar of best practice, sustainability and innovation for Māori land development.
She has represented Māori land matters in international forums, including the United Nations Indigenous Forum, and through Whāngārā being the first New Zealand beef farm to join McDonald’s Flagship Farmer Program in 2018.
Travelling across the world representing Whāngārā, she said, you had to represent your people first and then your country.
Collins’ career with Whāngārā B5 started at the age of 29 when her mother, Alice Ngaro, on her deathbed, told her she was to take her place on the B5 committee.
“I said, ‘Mum, what do I know about B5 and farming?’ But I listened and I put my name up for voting. It was the duty I was told to do.”
Collins has worked with many people over the years, including several who helped her learn quickly how committees and boards worked.
She has lived in Gisborne her whole life - attending Kaiti School, Gisborne Intermediate School and Gisborne Girls’ High.
Collins originally wanted to pursue being a dental nurse but, on the direction of her mother, did accounting and business.
“She had bigger plans for me.”
Thinking back over her life, Collins recalls the different people she has met and how she has always worked for the people of Gisborne.
“This is something for Gisborne. This is a payback to the community for everything I have experienced over the years.
“I just feel like ‘why would I deserve something like this when I am really just a normal person who was given a task to do?’.
Collins was a member of the AgResearch Māori Advisory Committee from 2013 to 2019 and was appointed to the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee from 2013 to 2015.
She has also had a career in health governance across a range of roles, including chief executive and owner of Three Rivers Medical from 2005 to 2022, and nine years as chair of the Tairāwhiti District Health Board [until 2011].
Collins is a trustee of Tairāwhiti Whenua Charitable Trust, Matai Medical Research Institute, Ngā Taonga ā Ngā Tama Toa Trust since 2008, and has been a trustee of Chelsea Private Hospital since 1999.
She was also a trustee from 2014 for the building and opening of 28 Māori Battalion C Company Memorial Trust House.
In 2009, Whāngārā Farms won the Ahuwhenua Māori Farm of the Year for sheep and beef.
Collins’ first name on her birth certificate is Nea, but when she went to school the teacher decided her name should be Ingrid. And it stuck.
She is the widow of All Black John Law Collins and has two children: Aaron Collins and Tanya Fuller.
Matai O’Connor, Ngāti Porou, has been a journalist for five years and kaupapa Māori reporter at the Gisborne Herald for two years.
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