Mana moana, mana tangata Testimonies on depletion and ...

like stuff you could get out in the ocean you could get in the estuary there was that good and that
changed in 1958 when the government at the time subsidised farmers to drain their lands and as a
consequence the Kaituna River was diverted before it got to the estuary and so as a consequence I think
we've only got now pipis left in our estuary, flounder, bit of pātiki, but that's it ... with the trying to drain
lands around here because this was a huge raupō area, ... there's all this pressure from farmers to get
some drainage going so they could use the land for dairying, whatever and that sort of happened late
1950s. There'd been a big flood and so the government helped secure funding to divert the river ... the
Ministry of Works was involved, drainage boards and that and the engineer said, ‘Don’t do it. It's not
going to work,’ and the Ministry of Works, I think, refused to listen and did it and it didn't stop the
flooding, but they put in the thing and then the groyne so it couldn't close again because they used to
deal with it all the time to close up, nature used to close it and that's just how it happens here, put
groynes in to keep it open here. The thing is that it never cured the flooding so that damage was done
and since that time, really, it's just been, the Kaituna River has just been looked at as a big drain. ... Wai
4 which was the claim for the Kaituna, Waitangi Tribunal claim and that happened when (?) Rotorua
District Council were going to put their sewerage in because the Kaituna actually comes from (?) from
Lake Rotoiti it starts and of course the Rotorua District Council at the time were going to put their
sewage raw into pipes and then divert it down to the Kaituna River. ...It didn't matter the damage it had
done, river’s just silted up since, or the estuary has. I think that for all of us in Maketu, the estuary was
why we were here. It's quite emotional actually, so the estuary, the families that were standing by the
estuary, it was just our culture really, and the estuary was why we were here. – Interviewee #15
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When I first came out to Waihou with my [X] I was 16, watercress was all up and down the river. We
could go there now and you could hardly find any, you know, it’s a good 25 years later. So you know,
the obvious ones, the sedimentation, (?) nutrient loading from the surrounding farmlands, all of those
things that have impacted on our waterways, but really the probably biggest significant influence on
that has been the local authorities and I guess, the disconnection between the iwi and the local
authorities historically in that there were no dialogue between them to, for us to share the loss of those
resources and also, I guess, they had no taringa at the time to hear any of the kōrero so thankfully that’s
starting to change but yeah, that’s a huge question. I think it boils down to the loss of rangatiratanga
over the ability to control the land and what it was used for which has created the situation we have
now. – Interviewee #18
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You got to be so careful, like one time they had a contract digging the pipeline, well they were supposed
to go underground across the pipi bed at (Rowaihi?) to (Pukehina?) to this water main, but they’re
supposed to go underground. Apparently he ran into trouble and so he used a bloody digger, going in at
low tide and digging up this trench and these people ring me up from (Rowaihi?) says, ‘Jesus
[Interviewee #19], you better get down here!’ So I got down there and I thought, ‘Oh Christ,’ and I
stopped the contract work. I stopped the contract work. I said, ‘Listen, we’re going to have to talk
about this because you’re going over pipi beds and stuff,’ and he said, ‘Oh I don’t think there’s any pipi
beds here. ...,’ I said that’s by-the-by, they move.’ I said they move so we closed the whole operation
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