Meremia and Ezra from Te Rangihakahaka Wakanoa and their model of a marae built to rise from floodwaters. Photo: RNZ / Libby Kirkby-McLeod
A group of rangatahi have designed a marae that is able to rise above floodwaters and shown their work at New Zealand's only science fair that celebrates the intersection of Mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge) and science.
Te Tūkohu Ngāwhā Mātauranga Māori Science and Design Fair took place in Rotorua from 23 - 25 July.
The Rotorua-based science fair is run by Te Arawa Lakes Trust and has grown rapidly over the last five years and for the first time schools from around the country were invited to take part.
Held inside the Rotorua energy events centre, students came up with ecological and climate solutions for tomorrow.
Meremia, Miss-Mei, and Ezra are from Te Rangihakahaka. They designed a model of a marae built on a platform, Ta Waka Noa, which would be able to rise above floodwaters.
They thought through inflation, flotation, and what was needed for survival while waiting for floodwaters to go down, including food and composting toilets.
Hikareia and Kaitlyn from Te Kura o te Whānau a Apanui and their project counting birds at the river of Motu on the edge of Gisborne. Photo: RNZ / Libby Kirkby-McLeod
Ezra said he hoped one day a system like it might save lives.
"This is a disaster-relief system. So, when it floats, everyone will be in there, the whole iwi - anyone is allowed to come in here - so it's like a public marae," he said.
Event co-ordinator Keeley Grantham said seeing projects like the one from Te Rangihakahaka was exactly why she was involved with the fair.
"That's a real-life issue that we are looking at with climate change, rising sea levels and marae being on floodplains. That's an amazing solution."
She said most New Zealand science fairs focus only on western science.
"This science fair is all about enabling different types of knowledge, different types of sciences and embodying a te ao Māori lens."
And there was a big focus on the environment, with categories including biosecurity, biodiversity and conservation, sustainability, marine and freshwater environments, Mātauranga Māori, and climate change adaptation and resilience.
One of the fair judges, Te Rika Temara-Benfell (centre) with others from Te Puna Ariki Charitable Trust. Photo: RNZ / Libby Kirkby-McLeod
One of the judges, Te Rika Temara-Benfell from Te Puna Ariki Charitable Trust, said the projects gave him hope for the future.
"They're just far beyond anything I was doing at that age. Some of them [are aged] nine and ten and they are researching microplastics and things happening across our environment and community."
An example of that is Hikareia and Kaitlyn from Te Kura o te Whānau a Apanui who counted birds at the river of Motu on the edge of Gisborne.
"We do it to see if the nature is living," Hikareia said.
They found terns, seagulls and plovers currently present in the environment.
Temara-Benfell said he was amazed by the projects he saw.
"It's been beautiful to see some of the solutions for these contemporary issues our rangatahi and children are facing, answered with Mātauranga Māori and not just that but from many different lens across other scientific fields and across community projects."
An earlier version of this story incorrectly named the school as Te Rangihakahaka Wakanoa. The school's name is Te Rangihakahaka, and Te Waka Noa is the name of the project.
