Summer is the best time of the year to get out and about on adventures, explore new places and spend some time relaxing, recharging and enjoying nature. If you’re travelling by car, van or motorhome, camping, hitch-hiking or renting a bach, there are really no barriers to continue to engage in our low-waste home habits.

How can we come together to address food security?

This was the main question that guided our actions in organising and promoting our Food Resilience Talks event on Thursday, 3rd of December. Given the importance of this topic and its growing relevance in the post-Covid context across Taranaki and Aotearoa, Sustainable Taranaki is now involved in the facilitation process to co-create a food secure communities plan for our region.

There are lots of ways to help our environment, and live a little lighter this holiday season. Therefore, we are proud to feature Karen Danenhauer from MamaGaia as our Sustainable Business Champion this month for her ingenuity in repurposing plastic into soap dishes.

Mummys in Need is a rapidly growing organisation that provides mothers and children with essentials that support the healthy growth and early development of their babies.

What is food resilience and how can we address the challenges that it implies? The conversation around food resilience in Taranaki is getting more relevant every time, as more and more actors, those who wish to enact positive change, start to engage in ways to secure our access to healthy, nutritious and affordable kai.

Kinderen Early Childhood Education Centre received the NPDC Waste Levy Fund this November for the purchase of reusable nappies to exclusively be used at their centre. With policies and procedures already in place, they are poised to make the transition. In order to commend their bold efforts to enact change as well as bring awareness to this more sustainable approach to running a childcare centre, we have named Kinderen our Sustainable Business Champion this month.

Ground Breaking Mushrooms hit the New Plymouth food scene with a spring debut at the Taranaki Farmers Market just a couple of weeks ago.

What an incredible 10 days with our garden hosts putting so much time and energy into sharing their knowledge and gardens with our community. We had record numbers attend this year and with the collaborative effort from the Taranaki Garden Festival and Arts Trail, we were able to engage new audiences and inspire people to take steps towards a more sustainable life.

The team at Cafe Green Door have been doing it right for a long time, and we’d like to give them a big pat on the back for their community building efforts, local, organic, and fair-trade best practices, and their ingenuity around sustainable initiatives.

Waitoriki & Inglewood Crop Swap continues to put a smile on everyone’s faces, as a strong wave of community aroha is felt by regulars and visitors alike who attend to swap their backyard produce, seedlings and excess household products. One of the first Crops Swaps to be established in Zealand, it is still as popular as when it began.

Some of our Sustainable Taranaki team members had the chance to participate in the Introduction to Resource Recovery course, a two-day training course by the Zero Waste Network held at The Junction on 15th and 16th of September.

Properly care for the clothes you already have. This sounds quite obvious but it’s good to keep in mind. What have you got already? Do you really need more? If you care properly for what you’ve already got, they will last longer and you won’t need to be buying more things. And if your clothes need some fixing, have a look at our list of shops that can help you out.

There are 178 other coffee retailers in New Zealand that have also implemented “Borrow A Cup” which are stainless steel, reusable cups that come in two sizes (eventually pint size for the keen festival goer…hint hint WOMAD), and cost $3.

Plastic waste is one of the main causes of pollution around the world. What’s the best solution to this problem? Reducing, reusing and refusing! We too often end up purchasing plastic that we cannot reuse, and the next best thing we can do is to recycle them. What plastic can be recycled will depend on where you are.

La Nuova Dry Cleaning Services caught our attention as they seek to continuously improve their dry cleaning and delivery processes to not only minimise their carbon footprint, but also bolster their bottom line.

Time is running out to curtail our cumulative CO2 emissions with less than 12 years to stabilise global warming at 1.5 degree C above pre-industrial temperatures (IPCC)1. With 20% of NZ’s carbon emissions from transport, we can all make an immediate impact through urgently changing how we travel.

A group of parents and children attended our workshop during the school holidays, and got creative in making artwork from colourful plastics that would have otherwise gone to landfill.

Taranaki has just hosted 3 Regenerative Farming workshops titled "Building Resilience Into Farm Systems" bringing groups of 24 to 35 together near Ōpunakē, Oākura and Inglewood/Koanga Moa. These inspiring and practical Workshops were run by Jules Matthews, a Regenerative Agriculture Coach & Educator with Integrity Soils.

Greenbridge is one of our main sponsors again this year, and owners, Bena and Dan, are opening their inspiring garden to the community. They have a wealth of experience to share, as well as their exciting new business ventures, including Healthy Home Plans.