Sustaining Te Taiao | SDGsummits

Webinar One | Sustaining Te Taiao | Tuesday 30 August 2022

Guest Speakers

Tukuroirangi Morgan

Tukuroirangi Morgan is of Waikato descent and was educated at St Stephen’s School and Huntly College. He worked as a news and current affairs reporter both at TVNZ and TV3, and was a Member of Parliament in the 1990s.

He became chair of Te Arataura, the Waikato-Tainui executive board, from 2006 until 2012 and in this time, he was Co-Negotiator alongside the late Lady Raiha Mahuta who both settled the Waikato River settlement claim with the Labour Government in 2008. The River settlement was passed into law in 2010 under the John Key led National Government.

Tukuroirangi has recently been re-elected as the chair of Te Arataura which will assist in navigating Waikato-Tainui into the future by working smarter, challenging how democracy works for Māori.

Tawera Nikau

Tawera Nikau is of Waikato iwi and is renowned as a world rugby league player. As a veteran rugby league player for New Zealand he has been inducted into the New Zealand Legends of League.

As acknowledgement for his contribution, Tawera has been appointed as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for Services to Rugby League and the community and in 2011, he was recognised as an Emerging Leader by the Sir Peter Blake Trust. Tawera s also a director and board member of the New Zealand Rugby League since 2013 and leads the review of the NZRL with other key stakeholders such as SPARC, High Performance New Zealand & NZRL Zones. He is also a current NZRL National Selector.

Tawera is a current trustee for the League for Life Foundation which is responsible for distributing funds to rugby league communities who have fallen on hard times and has the task to review the strategic direction, further funding streams and international relationships to support rugby league communities.

Tawera is also the current chair of Te Riu o Waikato which is tasked with Economic Development in the North Waikato that provides employment and training initiatives for those 12 maraes within North Waikato that consists of 16,000 Waikato-Tainui tribal beneficiaries.

Kowhai Olsen

Tooku marae, Ko Makaurau Marae ki Taamaki, Waikato me Ngaati Whaatua ngaa iwi, Ihumaatao tooku tuurangawaewae, Tooku tino ahurea, no te whakatauki. “Te Amorangi ki mua, te haapai o ki muri”

E mahi ana au mo tooku whaanau, aku marae me aku hapuu. He Kaitiaki Taiao mo Te Ahiwaru Trust.

Born and raised in Ihumaatao, Kowhai Olsen serves as a kaitiaki / resource management representative for Te Ahiwaru, Te Waiohua through the Maukaurau Marae Maori Trust (MMT). Her pepeha extends along the Oruarangi Estuary and the Manukau Harbour, and are highly esteemed taonga, without them her identity in Te Ao Maori is none.

Through her whakapapa and oral history, Kowhai understands the challenges that Te Waiohua values and priorities faced through prejudice, protection and preservation.

Kowhai is a current trustee for Te Motu a Hiaroa Charitable Trust and Te Pua nga Maara Rangatahi Innovations, where recipients were recently nominated for the BLAKE Youth Environmental Leader Award (2021) and Semi Finalist for Young New Zealander of the Year (2022). Kowhai is also an Environmental mentor of Para Patrol, which was the 2021 winners of Mayors Conservation Award and Penny Hulse Supreme Environment Award.

Kowhai, serves as a representative for Te Ahiwaru on various boards and committees at Auckland City Council and has assisted in establishing the Makaurau Marae Nursery – an iwi-led native plant nursery based at her marae in Ihumaatao, Mangere. This nursery serves towards strengthening her people through restoring the mauri of land, biodiversity, people and water – together.

“As Maori, if we seek acknowledgement for EVERYTHING we do, we would lose aspirational freedom. Is how I feel and do”.

Maluseu Monise

Moana, Oceania, Pacific greetings...

Noa'ia Gagaj atakoa!

Maluseu Monise is a Moana native who elongates two immediate bloodlines of the Rotuman (maternal) and Tuvaluan (paternal) peoples.

Maluseu is a Hanujuologist (Rotuman Storyteller) by trade, the cofounder of the Far Queue Podcast, Facilitator, and Space sharer.

He has been MCing local Pacific community, corporate, charity and NGO events for the past 10 years and is the current tuakana for Seed Waikato MC team, which aims at passing the torch to up and coming MC's. Maluseu is excited to bring all his family, his heart, his experiences, his tribe and his vibe to celebrate the SDG Summit Webinar Series 2022.

Fạiåkse'ea e hanisi