Kia ora Kōanga friends and family, thank you to everyone for donating! we are posting an update with bit more info.
All the photos on our give a little page are taken directly here on our road and our farm property. The pictures are of our access way and our lower fields where our stock graze and our research garden is situated. They are all of or Koanga access way and farm.
What was the impact of the cyclone directly on Koanga ?
This is a big conversation and its complex, I will try to explain as simply as I can. The cyclone has had a massive impact on us in many ways.
Initially we lost all power, for over 3 weeks, and there was no access to the outside world, we were completely cut off, no phone or power or ability to get help. Our river burst its bank, our roads and bridges damaged and completely covered, our river block was flooded, our seed gardens heavily affected. Because we had no power at peak seed drying time, we couldn’t run our seed dryers, this has affected our ability to get seeds dried and saved, so we have lost about 20% of our seeds and seed lines due to loss of power and the cyclone.
Because we were cut off we couldn’t get help, to harvest seed at the speed that it needed to be harvested, so we lost many seed lines which rotted on the seed heads because we couldn’t get the help we needed because our access way was cut off and the cyclone with the flooding, wind and rain directly affecting the power and the seeds still in the gardens.
The seeds are the main part of our business, without the seeds being saved we are in serious trouble as a business. So we set up a fund raise to help us purchase a couple of seed threshers as stated on the fund raise.
W are severely behind on all our work, because of the affects of the cyclone. We are working in a time sensitive business. The impacts are ongoing, we are not even back to base level yet.
The seed threshers will be able to speed us up to save what seeds are left so we don't loose an entire season of seeds. The seed thresher will help our business to recover from the direct affects of the Cyclone.
We have also had other massive impacts on our biz because of the cyclone, which we are not putting on the fund raise, but just to be transparent, we have lost stock, fences, access to our 50 hectare piece of land that we graze stock on. We have lost water pumps, bridges, fences and stairways. The affects are ongoing in some areas of our biz, we had no ability to courier packages out for many weeks. Nearly a month as the roads have been closed. We are not claiming for all of this from the fund raise, only the seed threshers, as stated on our page. The seed threshers will help our business to recover by speeding us up to save the seeds.
What are the specific costs involved with Cyclone recovery for Koanga?
There are huge recovery costs for us as a business, most of which we are not using the fund raise for.
The fund raise was specifically for seed threshers so we can recover as many seed lines as possible so we dont loose all our seeds. The cyclone has had a massive impact on us, as individuals and as a business, the stress, the physical effects of the cyclone, the threat of losing everything, the clean up, the toll its taken has been huge.
The costs of recovery are huge.
The costs of the seed threshers are $8,000.00 each. We raised enough to cover 1 and a little bit extra to put towards the second seed thresher that covers the larger seeds.
We thank everyone who donated, we are incredibly grateful. We will post updates using the seed thresher very soon.
The Kōanga team.
