Department of Conservation Sustainability Award Winner
Recognising a business or organisation that has introduced products, services, strategies or initiatives that are helping to reduce the organisation’s impacts on the environment and improve its long-term sustainability.
Okarito Kayaks
"Okarito Kayaks is a small, family-run kayak service, deeply invested throughout the last thirty years in supporting our backyard, our local community, and the stunning natural environment that sustains us. Last year, Okarito Kayaks started the GorseBusters project, as a positive response to Covid, and to look after the place that looks after us. We initially hoped to muster a few mates to clear gorse around the edge of Okarito Lagoon. With great support from across the West Coast, and all of NZ, the project took on broader aims; to energise the local community to do something positive out of adversity; enhance our region's reputation for looking after its backyard; and to do some real, tangible environmental good for the stunning place we call home. We’re hugely grateful for all the support we got from across the Coast to make that happen - so we’ll keep at it."