Epsom Girls Grammar School students Anushka Dissanayake (with the microphone) and Shriya Ganti (right of Anushka) spoke at the Moana Auckland Sustainability Expo last month.
Epsom Girls Grammar School students Anushka Dissanayake (with the microphone) and Shriya Ganti (right of Anushka) spoke at the Moana Auckland Sustainability Expo last month.
As the cheers and splashes of the Z Manu World Champs boomed outside, Auckland teenagers Liam Shaw and Logan Gardiner were networking inside the Viaduct Events Centre.
They were sharing their kina berley innovation – an idea to help preserve kelp forests while putting kina waste product to good use.
A pair of dive fins, a microscope and relentless optimism to restore degraded ecosystems of the Hauraki Gulf were tools of these and other forward-thinking teenagers presenting and exhibiting at Moana Auckland Sustainability Expo last month.
“We started this project last year after realising the problem with kina barrens, and the plan was to create a business and channel back money to help the kelp forests,” said Albany Senior High School student Liam, 16, of Greenhithe.
With guidance from Auckland-based EnviroStrat, whose junior project co-ordinator Ayla Lunn brought them on to their expo stand, the pair are working on prototypes and seeking help to refine their packaging: “which needs to be biodegradable but not completely soluble in water”.
Liam and Logan won Best Impact Project Award at Albany Senior High School.
Also attending the expo were fellow students Heather Darnley and Grace Price as journalists, to research the stallholders’ offerings and gauge public sentiment.
The event was funded by Tātaki Auckland Unlimited and delivered by Fresh Concept which made space available for those working in the Hauraki Gulf to showcase their efforts.
Speeches by rangatahi scientists Shriya Ganti and Anushka Dissanayake from Epsom Girls Grammar School opened the speaker series at the expo.
Although the audience was small, the girls enthusiastically shared work on “the impacts of nitrogen fertiliser on the heart rate of daphnia pulex [the water flea]”, and the importance of environmental DNA and water quality testing in restoring local streams.
Liam and Logan at the Moana Auckland Sustainability Expo. Photo / Supplied
Anushka entered an Auckland Science Fair Project after an idea was sparked when watching ducks at Western Springs, and noting the smell.
Three years on and now in Year 13, she said she had learned about herself as well as environmental science.
“It’s trusting that you can stick it out and believe in yourself because even if things fail, it’s a learning process.”
She said age was no barrier to tackling environmental challenges.
Heather and Grace at the Moana Auckland Sustainability Expo.
“And just because it hasn’t been done before, it doesn’t mean you can’t do it.”
Shriya said her project – in which many water fleas died in the process of measuring their tiny hearts – also taught her about human relationships.
“The research is the binding of the people coming together to help solve these problems.
“As I see it, learning more about others is how you can grow yourself.”
Young people were key to helping solve the challenge of degraded ecosystems in the Hauraki Gulf and oceans surrounding New Zealand, said EnviroStrat Sustainability Director Cerasela Stancu, who presented on the blue economy at the Expo.
Explaining the opportunity for new finance tools to capture value from conservation and restoration work, she said concepts evolved over time but, ultimately, the goal was finding and funding efforts to solve complex environmental problems.
“The blue economy was in many ways a subset of the green economy, which arrived on the back of the global financial crisis, around 2008 to 2010.
“At the time, we really hoped and believed that if we pushed investment in a green economy, we can kickstart the economy.
“But we realised we had major issues in the oceans because we tend to do planning with our backs to the sea.
“That’s how the blue economy came about – with OECD and others putting out research around it.”
Since that time, EnviroStrat has created impact ventures focused on the blue economy, including growing native New Zealand seaweed to create a sustainable supply chain, and exploring how scallops can be grown in an aquaculture setting rather than by dredging.
Last month, Westpac released its report A Sustainable Marine Sector, which highlighted the value of New Zealand’s marine economy to the Government’s goal of doubling export value over the next 10 years by transitioning to more sustainable practices.
The report estimated that in 2022, activities that use ocean resources contributed more than $10 billion to the New Zealand economy (3.9% of GDP).
However, if the sector moved to more sustainable practices, that figure could increase to $14b by 2035.
Stancu said New Zealand was already drawing down on its reserves of “natural capital”, making it imperative that restoration and conservation were given more priority, and support aided ocean restoration initiatives that weren’t easy to solve.
“What we believe is that we need to reverse the trend – we need to find the financial models that invest back in natural capital to reverse these trends.
“We can see that there isn’t enough capital from taxpayer money to support this transformation, therefore the challenge for us is finding ways to work with nature and attract private capital to provide public benefit.”
Stancu said the need for investment in biodiversity and conservation was driving new nature markets.
“It’s a different way of looking at the economy to stay within our planetary boundaries but also recover some of the things we’ve lost in nature around us.”
