17 April, 2025
Media Release
Backing community-led biodiversity protection
A $9.2 million investment into community-led biodiversity protection will benefit the environment and sustainable tourism, Conservation Minister Tama Potaka says.
The Department of Conservation – Te Papa Atawhai has chosen 20 groups who applied to the DOC Community Fund for support in protecting threatened species and ecosystems across Aotearoa New Zealand. A total of 291 groups applied for the 2025 funding round.
Among those is A Rocha (Karioi Project) which gets $438,690 for Te Whakaoranga O Karioi. It is a landscape-scale predator control between Whāingaroa and Aotea harbours to restore connectivity and protect threatened coastal cliff ecosystems, a regionally significant wetland (Toreparu), and the nationally critical matuku-hūrepo and pekapeka tou roa.
See earlier story below.
April 1, 2025 –
Waikato Regional Council has increased its natural heritage rate per property to $15 a year from $5.80 meaning projects like the one on Mt Karioi can happen, reports Dani Simpson.
A group of volunteers on Mt Karioi
A group restoring biodiversity on Mt Karioi says a grant of almost $400,000 is “an absolute game changer” for their kaupapa.
A Rocha Aotearoa New Zealand will receive $393,000 from Waikato Regional Council’s Natural Heritage Fund over four years towards Te Whakaoranga o Karioi – The Karioi Project.
The group has been working with the Raglan community for more than 15 years.
It operates a large-scale pest control programme on the Karioi maunga, a backyard trapping programme in surrounding rural and urban landscape, supports an iwi-led kākā reintroduction project, supports an iwi-led wetland restoration project at Toreparu Wetland, and runs an environmental education and awareness programme.
Project manager Kristel van Houte said the funding provides a base line of funding and the stability that the continuity of funding brings.
Kristel van Houte holds a grey faced petrel. Photo: Supplied.
“It also allows us to leverage other funders and helps us employ people on more permanent basis, and plan strategically for the next four years,” Kristel said.
“Our ability to scale up improves so much with this funding. Most funders fund only for a year, so having the longer term commitment is an absolute game changer.”
The Karioi Project is a significant employer in the local community with 10 part-time employees supported by an army of 50-60 regular volunteers and approximately 150 irregular volunteers.
The funding will go towards labour for pest animal control, a seabird/coastal ranger and a volunteer coordinator; mātauranga Māori cultural health monitoring; materials and expert guidance.
Karioi is a 2.4 million year old extinct stratovolcano eight kilometres south west of Raglan. It was the earliest of the line of six calcalkalic volcanoes, the largest of which is Mount Pirongia. The others are Kakepuku, Te Kawa, Tokanui, Waikeria and Puketotara.
Waikato Regional Council has granted $1.34 million from its Natural Heritage Fund towards four landscape scale environmental projects. Alongside The Karioi Project, grants for projects at northern Coromandel Peninsula, Mt Pirongia and the Kaimai-Mamaku Ranges were approved.
The council has increased its per property natural heritage rate from $5.80 per annum to $15 as part of is 2024-2034 Long Term Plan. This has provided a significant boost to the funding available to support more work to protect and restore the region’s native plants and animals, special landscapes and ecosystems.
The next Natural Heritage Fund round will open in April, for the 2025/26 financial year, with approximately $1.4 million to distribute.
Kristel van Houte (at front) with the Karioi team, from left: Amber Jones, Caleb Cutmore, Anne Windust, Jasmine Edgar, Louie Galloway, Terence Hohaia, Lenny Reynolds, Val Lubrick and Isabelle Lance. (Missing is Georgia Cummings). Photo: Supplied.
