Taupō natural burial advocate Linda McGrogan (left) with Mark Blackham of New Zealand Natural Burials at the Taupō Cemetery site to be set aside as a natural burials area. Photo / Laurilee McMichael
Taupō natural burial advocate Linda McGrogan (left) with Mark Blackham of New Zealand Natural Burials at the Taupō Cemetery site to be set aside as a natural burials area. Photo / Laurilee McMichael
Natural burials will go ahead at Taupō Cemetery - but they could be some months off yet.
The Taupō District Council is looking at beginning natural burials from mid to late 2021 but will first hold a public meeting to discuss them with the community.
Linda McGrogan and Jean Caulton, two Taupō residents who approached the council last year to ask for it to approve natural burials, is delighted they will soon be an option, with an area at Taupō Public Cemetery to be set aside.
A few more months will still be required to consult with the community and tidy up legal issues, as well as planting and mulching to be undertaken at the proposed natural burials area before it will be ready for use.
Natural burials allow conditions for speedy decomposition, and regeneration of a natural forest above the graves. Nothing is introduced that would interfere with or pollute environmental processes.
Plots are shallow and the bodies are not embalmed. They are buried in shrouds of natural fibre or coffins of untreated wood. The grave plots are filled with aerobic, organically active soil, over-planted with a tree native to the area, and the whole cemetery is gradually restored to native bush.
The grave's location is recorded by GPS in cemetery records rather than with a headstone, although some natural burial sites also have a remembrance wall with plaques.
Whangerei man David Stevens campaigned for natural burials and when he died in July 2018, was able to have the natural burial he had wished for. File photograph / John Stone
Currently the district's three main cemeteries in Taupō, Tūrangi and Mangakino do not make provision for natural burials and the only options are standard burial or cremation.
Several other districts have already made, or plan to make provision for natural burials, including Wellington, Auckland, Carterton, Otaki, Nelson, Motueka, Hamilton, Whanganui, New Plymouth and Hastings.
Mark Blackham of New Zealand Natural Burials, a volunteer organisation which has been helping councils around the country establish natural burial areas, visited Taupō before Christmas to look at the new area and offer advice to the council on setting it up.
He said there have been 500 or so natural burials in 15 natural burial areas throughout New Zealand already, and Taupō was ahead of the game, although it was a different story two decades when natural burials were first proposed.
"We rang all the councils, including this one [Taupō] 20 years ago and said 'would you be interested in setting up a natural cemetery?' and all of them said 'no', but some time, I guess five, six or seven years ago, it turned into councils ringing us up and saying 'how do we make this happen?'," Mark said.
He said the pressure had come from local communities and the New Zealand Cemeteries and Crematoria Collective. In the greater Wellington area, where natural burials have been available at Wellington Natural Cemetery at Mākara for several years, some 12 per cent of people dying had opted in advance for a natural burial. The Wellington Natural Cemetery has already filled its first natural burial site and has now opened up a second which was filling fast, Mark said.
"In other places it takes a while for the word to get around, and that's why I'm still doing this, 20 years later."
New Zealand Natural Burial founder Mark Blackham pictured in 2007 in the area where New Zealand's first natural burial site was established at Makara Cemetery. File photo / Crispin Anderlini
He said his organisation was called every day by people looking for information on natural burials and sadly some of them had missed out on the burial they wanted because there was not yet a natural burial area in their home town.
"But there's been plenty more who have been able to use a [natural] cemetery because of the work that they did and it was set up in their lifetime.
"They don't want a cremation or be buried in a normal spot but people look forward to a natural burial, they like the look of where they are going to, they know they are going to a better place," Mark said.
"But family has to know, so you either write a living will or just keep reminding your kids or whoever's going to be left behind. Kids and children don't seem to want to know so often older people need to persist and make sure that it's clear, so even just a handwritten note in the top drawer or pinned to your noticeboard at home."
Advocates of natural burial say the process is kinder to the environment and nourishes the earth, unlike traditional burial where the casket and body can take years to break down because of the lack of soil microbes at depth. The decomposition may also release chemicals in the process. Alternatively, there is cremation, which uses energy and releases carbon dioxide.
Linda says with a tree planted on top of every grave in the natural burial area, the end result will be a beautiful grove of native bush.
Taupō Funeral Services, which handles the majority of funerals in the Taupō district, is supportive of natural burials. Owner Barry McIntosh said the company would be offering them as an option once the natural burial area was ready for use.
Linda and Jean plan to organise a public meeting in conjunction with Taupo District Council and New Zealand Natural Burials at some stage so that locals can find out what is involved in a natural burial or for inquiries you can email gogreener7@gmail.com or visit naturalburials.co.nz.
