Valuing volunteers
Community groups, mostly of made up of volunteers, drive a major part of the conservation effort in New Zealand. Almost all work is carried out in partnership with one or […]
Resilience
The Institute of Sustainable Development defines socio-ecological resilience as “…the ability of an individual or system to combat adversity, deal with difficulties and otherwise bounce back and progress”. To this, […]
Common Ground?
Who or what is ‘the community’? It’s another one of those terms that seems to be a catch-all for ‘everybody else’. I’ll also confess to frequent use of community without […]
He Tangata, he tangata, he tangata – the people, the people, the people
Wetlands are often referred as the barometer catchment health, but their function as barometer of the health of the people is often overlooked (or frankly, just ignored). The biennial National […]
Research Snapshot #2
Over a few short weeks in September last year, nearly 300 NZ community groups responded to an email questionnaire. Two main themes were explored – the scope and nature of […]
James Cook & his ‘Wild Musick’
In 1770, botanist Joseph Banks described the cacophony of austral bird sounds as almost imitating “…small bells but with the most tuneable silver sound imaginable…” It must have been extraordinary, […]
Finding local solutions
The Waikato Biodiversity Forum Day, this time in Taupo, provides me with yet more thought provoking perspectives on what community groups do and why. Their words strengthen, confirm and add […]
Seed – Flower – Fruit
An almost overwhelming number of dialogues underway from government agencies to volunteers are exploring the overlay between community groups, science-based tools and data generation. If the ‘seeds’ are the groups […]
Driven to document
What drives people to document? I’ve borrowed the title of a multi-artist exhibition which takes 5-yearly in the northern German town of Kassel, because ultimately artists, like scientists observe and […]
Celebrating the ‘grassroots’
A couple of weeks back, I attended the Yellow-Eyed Penguin Trust’s conference – Celebrating 25 years of restoring habitat, sharing knowledge, corporate sponsorship by Mainland and protecting one of the […]
monicalogues 