Need a break from bad news? Positive stories you might have missed

Transcript

(Brianne)
Kia ora kaitiaki and welcome to Now That's What I Call Green. I'm your host, Brianne West, an environmentalist and entrepreneur trying to get you as excited about our planet as I am. I'm all about creating a scientific approach to making the world a better place, without the judgment and making it fun. And of course, we will be chatting about some of the most amazing creatures we share our planet with.

(Brianne)
So if you are looking to navigate through everything green or not so green, you have come to the right place. Okay, marvellous. Welcome to the studio, Kate.

(Kate)
I'm so scared. I don't know what we're doing. This is my favourite kind of podcast.

(Brianne)
You should be scared. The last few episodes have been a little bit heady. First with the climate change episode, which was grim. Then we had the political roundup, which made me so angry. It was not funny. I did not know how much our government sucked. Absolute. I'm trying not to be biased. I did not realise how many decisions our government had made with which I do not agree. So nice lighthearted episodes. They were great. Yeah. Yeah. So I thought we all needed a break from the world

(Brianne)
because none of that's good news out there. And we're going to talk about positive news. So I have some fun news stories to talk through with you.

(Kate)
Oh, okay. Love.

(Brianne)
That's the plan. So welcome back to the positive podcast. We are always talking a hopeful note. Anyway, first question for you, out of the blue, she's got no preparation for this, so give her some grace. When you think about climate or nature or sustainability or the environment in general, what's the one thing that makes you feel

(Kate)
a little bit hopeful,

(Brianne)
even if it feels really small or stupid?

(Kate)
I feel like working with interns that are under the age of 20, that their knowledge or access to knowledge far supersedes what I had. So, I'm 32, I feel like if I was interested in that space, which to be fair I wasn't at 18 or 19, it would have been much harder unless I'd gone to university to be able to access anything. So, for example, people calling brands out on TikTok or greenwashing and stuff, I wouldn't have even known about that then.

(Brianne)
Yeah, I like that. You can't say it's a bad thing that you have so much access to so much information because I do think it's causing a lot of people anxiety and overwhelm, but

(Kate)
it is definitely a good thing in many respects. I feel like you're allowed to know, right? Like you're allowed to argue with the government, you're allowed to push back on things at a much younger age and those conversations feed into your daily life. For example, I'll see people buying clothing and they'll be, like I say, under the age of 20 and they'll come to work and they'll be like, oh I got this coat and then talking about that it came from a place that is, you know, ethical will actually

(Kate)
be something that they even bother to say. I just feel like I never said that at that age. I didn't make any decision based on that. But then at the same time, I didn't have Temu and Shein. Do you know what I mean? I didn't have the villain in the story either.

(Brianne)
You did, you had Jay Jays, right? I remember when Jay Jays came to the town where I grew up and it was like somewhere we wouldn't hang out because it was this new shiny, how exciting, super cheap place you could go and buy all sorts of things and not once did I ever think about where it was made or where it came from.

(Brianne)
Yeah, I was about to say I didn't know that was bad. Same with Supre, same with Kmart coming in. You don't know it's bad until you know the good. Like you have to have access to the good to realise that you have a villain. Yep. Now, access to education and information is massively different.

(Brianne)
So that's definitely a good one.

(Kate)
Also the fact that we know so many people are working to make a difference.

(Brianne)
Yes, and they can see those role models in action. Like I also think it's more accessible to donate to overseas causes. Back in the day, from like an investment point of view, you had to be a middle-aged white man to invest and you had to put down 10 grand. Now you can be an 18-year-old female putting $5 on Sharesies and an investment fund

(Kate)
that is good for the planet, or you could donate to a cause you saw on TikTok. I just feel like for everything that's bad, it also, if you use it well, can be positive.

(Brianne)
Yeah, yeah, for every tool humans create, there's always a downside. That's what we do, but agreed.

(Brianne)
There is a lot of good that does come from things. And then the other thing, I think probably one of the biggest things for me is this place. When I bought it, talking about my lifestyle block, it was neglected and sad and filled with weed mats and misery, right? And now it's just awesome. Stunning.

(Brianne)
And that's in three years. And there's been an awful lot of work and a fair amount of investment, but it didn’t have to be. Like it could have been done slower and cheaper. But the fact that I now have a bellbird waking me up most mornings.

(Kate)
It's so cool.

(Brianne)
Really annoying actually, because I'm not a morning person. But also you can't be mad at a bellbird

(Kate)
because she's beautiful. Like property, you know, we're here now and it's stunning and you had the potential to be like, I just want a huge lawn and a soccer field, like, do you know what I mean? Like, obviously you don't have kids, so we look at that with a very different lens.

(Kate)
True, true. But when you got here and you saw what it currently had, you again had the accessibility to find out what to do to make it better, like the wildflower zone. You even said that you got some of that inspiration from online, and I feel like you've got room for a veggie garden and you're constantly thinking about how to grow your own ecosystem. Yeah, that's really cool.

(Kate)
I wouldn't have a clue where to start with that, like that's why your podcast has been quite handy for the residential side or even people in apartments.

(Brianne)
Just dig it out. Just dig it up.

(Brianne)
If you've got a piece of lawn, dig it up.

(Kate)
Yeah, do something with it.

(Brianne)
It's really helpful, isn't it, for everyone listening. What? What do you mean?

(Kate)
Just dig it up, bro. Dig up your concrete outside your apartment.

(Brianne)
Yeah.

(Brianne)
But I have some actual, you know, outside these four-ish walls, good stories. You know how everybody is forever blaming the likes of China and India as the sole sources of climate change? And what's the point in Aotearoa doing anything when India and China aren't doing anything? Well, I talked about China in a couple of podcasts ago and how much they are actually doing, but India is doing just as much, if not more, right?

(Brianne)
So they are the third-largest emitter globally, about 7% of the global total, which is a lot, but let's not forget there are a lot of people living there. There are more than a billion people who live there.

(Brianne)
So per capita, their emissions per person are 1.9 tons, versus New Zealand at 6.7.‍

(Kate)
Per person?

(Brianne)
Yeah.

(Kate)
Yeah, well, when you put it like that.

(Brianne)
It's 15 tons in Australia. Think about where the majority of Australia's power comes from, and the minerals and stuff they export. But India is closer to its Paris Agreement targets than we are, or Australia. Well, they’re still highly insufficient because nobody — not a single country on Earth — is on track to meet the Paris Agreement.

(Kate)
No.

(Brianne)
But it doesn’t matter because of course we've blown past 1.5; we just have to hold it to 2 degrees now. But they have now enough solar and wind to power 80 million homes, which is like every house in the UK, Ireland, and Australia all together.

(Kate)
Do you think that New Zealand is just good marketing then? Yeah. Like we love a competition with Australia, so don’t get me wrong, there'll be people listening to that stat who are stoked,

(Kate)
but it's actually terrible because we should be competing on what we're doing positively as a country. We just view China and India as these mass producers and maybe got tarnished with that even as children because my dad used to go on trips for work to China and he'd bring us back

(Kate)
like this amazing robotic tech that we couldn’t get here. Like I had a little puppy that ran around, you know, and I was so stoked no one else had that. Whereas now everyone just absolutely — like that's tarnished, and no one looks further like you do to get those stats.

(Brianne)
I think we used to be a global leader in many respects.

(Brianne)
We have dropped the ball in some ways. I mean, our farmers are some of the most climate-friendly farmers on Earth. That’s inarguable, but that doesn’t necessarily mean our farming is without impact, of course. But yeah, and the more this government just goes through our environmental protections like a

(Brianne)
wrecking ball, the worse it’s going to get. And the worse it is for businesses who are trying to export too, which is why I find it just a breathtakingly stupid decision.

(Brianne)
This is a positive podcast.
Sorry.
Don’t let me rage about it.

(Kate)
Should we play good and bad angel? Okay, so when I look outside, I see in New Zealand — this is in my head — I see lots of green. Yeah, I see farming and that actually, to be honest, to me is not all negative. Like I say, I’m not in the climate space, so you know, and I eat meat, so I can’t judge that much. So I look outside and I look at New Zealand and I think, wow, so green, so safe, like that’s how I grew up, that’s my perspective. India seems very like,

(Kate)
you know, people-heavy. I just imagine — like when I went to Thailand, I just imagine the busyness and the smells and the emissions, like, do you know what I mean? I just picture that, but then it’s not quantifiable when you’re a visitor in the country. It’s only when you dig deep.

(Brianne)
And it’s just, it’s looking past the media propaganda — and propaganda sounds quite harsh, but it is — it’s just looking past the stuff that you assume because it’s what you’re taught, right?

(Brianne)
And it’s not to say that people don’t have preconceived notions. I find it very irritating when people go, oh, but it’s made in China.

(Brianne)
Particularly about electric cars, right? They are the best electric cars on the market.

(Kate)
Yeah.

(Brianne)
The swastika.

(Kate)
We need it.

(Brianne)
Couldn’t just— I used to have a swastika, sorry, Tesla.

(Kate)
You know, I did not come here for that. I think that was genius.

(Brianne)
Yeah, I feel sorry for Tesla owners because they probably bought them well before Elon became a— I have no words. But like electric vehicles, China has led the way in so many ways, and ethically as well: their batteries are often free of cobalt, for example. So yeah, this xenophobia we have is totally misplaced.

(Brianne)
But yes, I mean, India is expanding its coal because it needs to move into the more developed world, if you want to use those definitions. They are adding more renewable capacity than coal. And I just think sometimes we need to pay attention. If you look at solar in Aotearoa, actually it looks like Australia because Australia is doing well here.

(Brianne)
Thirty percent of Australian homes have solar panels.

(Kate)
Yeah, wow. And are they incentivised to put them in?

(Brianne)
I believe in some states they are, like South Australia is leading the way, which is not the state you’d think. You’d assume the sunnier states — not that South Australia isn’t sunny — but in Queensland it’s sunnier. But I guess you’d have to fight off all the bloody spiders on the solar panels. Could you think of anything worse?

(Kate)
There’d be some kind of tradie and that would stress me right out. Yeah, that’s definitely not the career path for you.
I’ll tell you that for free.

(Brianne)
Oh no, Australia, God.

(Kate)
I think you should stick to Incrediballs.

(Brianne)
Oh, there would be like webs. No, I’m fine, no. And a snake — never mind the snake.

(Kate)
The snake, yeah, me and the snake would just be buds.

(Brianne)
We’re going to Australia for a holiday up to Port Douglas in a couple of months. And I am very excited because snakes are often found at the place we’re staying. So I will just die of happiness in Norley.

(Brianne)
Anyway, this is off topic.

(Kate)
Well, I went to get solar panels for our house. We did a big renovation. I was like, you know, now’s the time. And we were incentivised through ANZ. We could get solar panels.

(Brianne)
Because of the Green Home Loan?

(Kate)
Yeah, 1%. 1% home loan. I think it was like three years, which we utilised for double glazing, woollen carpets — there was a lot of good things going on there. We considered solar panels.

(Kate)
And then we got absolutely put off. So we got put off from, this is just obviously friends and word of mouth, but it was like, oh, they’re not going to make you your money back for 10 years kind of thing. So that was the first myth, question mark. And then the second thing was,

(Kate)
oh, our grid is not established enough that if you make extra, you know, like sure, you might get some kind of cash incentive putting it back in the grid, but it’s not — it’s almost like not worth it. No. And we can’t handle it. Yeah. And so—

(Brianne)
You were actively put off it, right?

(Kate)
Yeah, and that sucks, right? Because I was considering it, which should be the first step for people to, I feel like, come on board and incentivise me, make the most of their interest

(Brianne)
and be like, hey, all the great things about it. But I just wasn’t. The power companies have a stranglehold on our power generation, for sure. Like we will — it’s going to take an awful lot, and it will take government regulation to get solar and microgrids, which are of course, you know, community-specific generation. Not like a mini dam, but say a cluster of houses, like my three neighbours and I would all have solar panels and share, say, a battery, right?

(Kate)
Yeah, see that’s great.

(Brianne)
Yeah, but under the current regulations, there’s no incentive financially for us to do that.
No.

(Brianne)
Because we can’t put it back into the grid.

(Kate)
And then you have to do it around the give or take 10 years. If you don’t see that for 10 years and you’re paying power bills, you know, oh, well, what was the point? I read overseas there was a country where every time they put in a car parking building — maybe it was like Norway or Sweden, Switzerland, somewhere like that, they always seem like the world leaders again from a marketing perspective —

(Kate)
and they said, every time we put in a car park building, we must roof it, like put solar panels on the roof.

(Brianne)
Yeah, how is that not a global rule, right?

(Kate)
Yeah, how is that not a global rule, right? Yeah, totally. That is great. Incentivise — like they’ll have something for the building companies or property developers. And then as a small country, we should be able to pick up on that stuff and implement it within the year, surely.

(Brianne)
Yep, and I know there’ll be people saying, oh, but where are we going to get the minerals for solar panels and you can’t recycle them. That is a myth. And they last longer than they used to. And if you follow Mike from Electrify Aotearoa, who are wonderful and have just released their manifesto about how New Zealand could be electrified, the payback for solar panels in most places here

(Brianne)
is just four years, which is really quite achievable for a lot of people, particularly with things like the Green Home Loan.

(Kate)
Yes, so they need to be doing more marketing and education around that to convert people like me. So at the dinner parties, I can say, 10 years, that’s dramatic. I heard it was four, and then I go and buy it, right?

(Brianne)
Yeah, because did you know half of your power bill is actually the transmission? So not generation or the actual electricity itself. It’s getting it to you.

(Kate)
I did. That blew my mind, actually.

(Brianne)
But there’s a couple of microgrids — Auckland has a pilot microgrid DC thing for lighting and appliances and stuff.

(Brianne)
And there’s one on Great Barrier Island as well, which is basically just a solar and battery system, which powers a pub — which is important — and a neighbouring building of some description, and it’s all solar or 98% solar. It used to be diesel. Pretty cool.

(Kate)
How much does that impact you when you’re deciding on like — I mean, office spaces might be difficult in Christchurch, but would you ever have Incrediballs set up here and in a building? Like, is that going to need a building eventually? Oh, definitely. Well, I mean, free the laundry. Yes, right. We’re all holding our water-filled glasses up, you know, empty of flavour, waiting. We’re going to start a campaign. It’s going to be my glasses waiting for Incrediballs. You just have to give me like a one-week lead time.

(Brianne)
Great, great. Yeah, OK. Yeah. Solar panels and that sort of generation wouldn’t have an enormous impact because there probably isn’t a great deal of choice here, but it would be great for something for landlords to add to it.

(Kate)
That’s a complicated question, probably. Because I was like, imagine you hire one commercial building over the other because they’ve shown you how they, I don’t know — factories seem cold, they’re large spaces, right? So if I was a landlord, I would love to incentivise someone,

(Kate)
even maybe they spend more monthly rent with me because I’ve kept it warmer, the office space is warmer. And these are all the steps I’ve taken for it to be as, I don’t know, environmentally friendly as possible.

(Brianne)
Yeah. Marketing — everything’s marketing.

(Kate)
Everything is marketing.

(Brianne)
Okay, I’m going to blab through some fun, good community topics.

(Kate)
She’s not even smiling. She said the word fun and she didn’t even smile.

(Brianne)
Well, I’m just doing it naturally. I’m keeping an eye on the time, actually. Okay, because I’m doing this podcast not dressed. I’m not naked. I’m in my dressing gown. And Kate and I are friends, so it’s fine. This is not unusual.

(Brianne)
I record this podcast regularly in a dressing gown.
It’s terrible.

(Kate)
But did you know that we — well, I say we — I think last month. Isn’t that cool? That is a positive news story.

(Brianne)
Yeah. So up in — there’s a sanctuary in Nelson and of course it’s 700 hectares, so it’s not a small sanctuary, which is good because of course kiwi are quite roamy and adorable, and it’s fully predator-fenced and been pest-free since 2017. So they were obviously waiting for a long margin of safety there. That’s very cool.

(Kate)
I feel like I have more chance of seeing that than I do at Willowbank, you know, walking in the dark, enclosed.

(Brianne)
Go to the far north. You see them wild — not all the time, they’re not just all over the show,

(Kate)
you don’t just walk in twilight. Okay, because sometimes I feel like we’re the only country that’s like, here’s our national mascot but like, don’t worry about actually seeing it. It could be a myth, but like, no stress.

(Brianne)
Well, Australians have drop bears, of course. I mean, I’ve never seen a drop bear. Have you seen a drop bear? Oh, you’re making a face. Have you not heard of the myth of the drop… Okay. Kiwis, which isn’t actually a myth, they’re real, yes. Well, drop bears are a cartoonised version of koalas that Australians have made up to try and scare tourists with for some reason.

(Kate)
They drop on your head?

(Brianne)
And murder you, yeah.

(Brianne)
This isn’t true, just to be really clear. To anybody listening, drop bears are not real.

(Kate)
We don’t need to make Australia scary, as the spiders manage that all on their own. Australia makes koala bears seem scary. That is like peak — you know what I mean? That is peak Australia. We have snakes, spiders, and we also have these fucking bears that fall on your head.

(Brianne)
Yeah, pictures of them are like dripping blood and they’ve got fangs and stuff, yeah. No, they’ve gone, they’ve gone all the way.

(Kate)
No, kiwi are much cuter.

(Brianne)
Cuter than a koala bear? They are not cuter than a sugar glider. Cuter than a drop bear, yeah. Oh, I love a sugar glider. Oh my god, the first time I saw a sugar glider I about died.

(Kate)
Love a sugar glider. Where were you? Australia?

(Brianne)
Yeah.

(Kate)
Yeah.

(Brianne)
Daintree rainforest. Yeah.
They come out sort of dusk.

(Brianne)
Oh, they’re so cute. You could just die. Actually die and it would be worth it. Tasmanian devils were wiped out from the mainland about 3,000 years ago, which probably wasn’t as much our fault as everything else’s. That was almost certainly mostly due to dingoes, but probably has something to do with us too.

(Kate)
The only interaction I’ve had with a Tasmanian devil was—

(Brianne)
Is the cartoon.

(Kate)
No, it was at Orana Park where they were walking on a track, right? So there’s all this grass, they were walking on a track, two came up to each other, and instead of just a little bit walking around each other, you know, like one step to the left, they hissed, they roared, whatever you call that noise they made.

(Kate)
It was, I was like, to my sister, so what do we think they’re doing? No, they were just arguing over this one square metre of land. Okay. Well, it could have been a really good square metre. So… Could have been delicious. Put it this way, I’m not surprised if they get wiped out anywhere because they didn’t

(Kate)
seem… Look, I know, I know, but like just walk around.

(Brianne)
Well, you’ve seen the cartoon, you know that they are not the most reasonable animals you’ve ever met.

(Kate)
They are.

(Brianne)
They are hilarious. Okay, they’re nothing like the cartoon, again. I think they’re adorable. Grumpy old men. But Aussie Ark released 30 into another predator-free sanctuary in New South Wales. By 2021, which is just a year later, there were seven babies.

(Brianne)
And by 2023, there were 500.

(Kate)
Yeah, it’s because they don’t walk out of one square of land, so they’re together, so they’re getting — it’s like they’re like, oh, we’re here now. We’ve finished fighting. We may as well do something about it. Honestly.

(Brianne)
Well, the three Fs, right? There’s a biology book that’s got a famous passage that says something about the three Fs: feeding, fighting, and mating. Because of course you can’t say the other F word in polite company.

(Kate)
You should bleep my other one out.

(Brianne)
Yeah. Beavers have gone back to Portugal and to the UK, which is amazing because beavers are the coolest things ever. Have you ever seen a beaver on TikTok, like eating a chunk of — just so cute, and they use their little hands.

(Kate)
And they just seem harmless. Like they seem like they only do good. Like they’re in the water, are they?

(Brianne)
Unless you’re a tree, I suppose,

(Kate)
which you might think a little bit differently. But in the water, they’re making dams, like, what’s a beaver going to do? Do you know what I mean? I feel like he’s just very unbothered.

(Brianne)
Yeah, I would agree. And they saved Portugal, like, millions of dollars by creating some dam that, you know, human engineers would have taken several years to do.
Very cool.

(Brianne)
And they help to reduce wildfire risk. Yeah, great. So they slow water flow, they recreate wetlands that we’ve drained, improve biodiversity, sequester carbon — we continually underestimate how important various species are.

(Kate)
Has Australia ever thought about borrowing some beavers during wildfire season?

(Brianne)
So I read a news report yesterday that a bunch of students at a university somewhere — I didn’t pay attention to details, standard — they have started using sound waves to put out fires, which could have massive ramifications. Imagine if you could put out fires in drought-prone regions like California without water.

(Kate)
Yeah, amazing. Okay, yeah, we should follow that up. You should find out that university.

(Brianne)
I should look into that more before talking about it. I will.

(Kate)
No, great.

(Brianne)
But it’s just all these things that are going on that you don’t hear about, right? There’s a local group called Harbour Care up in Raglan. They have planted 2 million native trees. Their nitrogen in their water is down 45% in just 10 years. E. coli is down by 80%. So their water is one step closer to being swimmable and drinkable because so much of it is in…

(Brianne)
Kai, Auckland — they’ve got food forests all over Auckland. So heaps of communities have access to food that perhaps they didn’t already because of course food poverty is very much a thing here.

(Kate)
Yeah.

(Brianne)
In Queensland, there are 150 schools that have solar power, saving some — some schools are saving $10,000 each. In power.

(Kate)
And honestly, so many of these things that are environmentally friendly, again, not coming from the space, save money — like position it. You’d say this: position your marketing. Number one, they care about the farmers, the everyone, they care about the financial save before they care about the sustainable. That sometimes can just be a positive byproduct.

(Kate)
And it’s not because they don’t care about the climate, right?

(Brianne)
No, no, no.

(Kate)
It’s because unfortunately the world we live in, things have to add up financially.

(Brianne)
That’s right.

(Kate)
You have to have that first and then you can care once you’re sustainable financially. Yeah, honestly, I think a lot of marketing misses a trick there or providing the education around it. And so, I don’t know, maybe the people that don’t think of these new technologies don’t have a marketing kind of brain, right? So there’s a lot of people out there doing these incredible things, but if nobody knows about them,

(Kate)
it feels very worthless.

(Brianne)
Totally.

(Kate)
Keep sending Brianne on Instagram your positive news stories.

(Brianne)
Yeah, send me the good stuff. Honestly. And every now and then we’ll do a roundup, because this is really interesting. The last thing I wanted to end on was, because there are so many good things — so last week was the UN Ocean Conference in Nice, and I have no time for a lot of these conferences like COP, whatever number this year is.

(Brianne)
They’re building a road through the Amazon so that delegates can get to COP. You couldn’t make this shit up. They are building a road through ancient rainforests for a conference about climate change. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it was real until I did a whole bunch of research, and I think it’s unfathomable. But they achieved some stuff at this treaty. So the High Seas Treaty

(Brianne)
is basically about protecting the international waters that no country governs, if you like. They needed 60 signatories to ratify it. So a whole bunch of countries — in excess of, I think, 100 and something, 120, maybe even 140 countries — have signed it, but only 55 have ratified it. And for it to come into force, we need 60. So just five short.

(Brianne)
We are not one of them. What a surprise. But yeah, they expect it to be kicking off in January 2026. And that means legally binding marine protection in international waters, which will be the first time ever. That’s pretty freaking cool.

(Kate)
Okay. I feel like New Zealand should get on board with that. Yeah. I mean, not wanting to be in government — I don’t think you or I would either survive there, but I…

(Brianne)
Only as a dictator.

(Brianne)
Would you? Do you want to be my… You could be second in charge if you like.

(Kate)
Oh, easy.

(Brianne)
Basically, you just do everything I say,

(Kate)
which will probably be a struggle. Sign this form and I’m like, okay, what did it say? But anyway, at least we’d ratify it, right? I feel like, and then we’d tell our mates, we only need four more.

(Brianne)
We wouldn’t need one because we’d just be like, guys, we’re not fishing in that section of the ocean.

(Kate)
Yeah, we’re probably far away from it. Where is it?

(Brianne)
International waters are all over the place.

(Kate)
Pirates.

(Brianne)
I’m all about pirates. Yeah, the ridiculous things they did, but pirates to protect the sea — imagine that, marine saviour pirates.

(Kate)
Yeah, well they do exist, don’t they? Sea Shepherd and the guy who founded it, who’s split with Sea Shepherd now. I cannot think of his name, that’s annoying.

(Brianne)
Anyway, his new foundation too. I’ll have to put that in the show notes, I cannot believe I’ve forgotten his name. But there’s a couple of other things. They also announced €8.7 billion in funding commitments for ocean conservation because the ocean for some reason is the least-funded conservation environmental thing.

(Kate)
I know why. Immediately I know why. Well, because you can’t see anything.

(Brianne)
And people have no empathy for fish. It’s very bizarre.

(Kate)
There is a weird disconnect between how important the ocean is and how important we treat it.

(Brianne)
Yeah.

(Kate)
You put your ankles in the beach and then you’re like, well, I don’t need to save that because the water looks so good. Do you know what I mean?

(Brianne)
Yeah. French Polynesia established the world’s largest marine protected area, about 5 million square kilometres.

(Brianne)
Only 1.1 is fully protected, but there are more protections that are going to go through next year. Samoa did something similar, protected I think almost all of its waters, which is about 330,000 square kilometres, which is about the size of Vietnam.

(Kate)
Wow.

(Brianne)
Tonga has expanded into new marine reserves. Like these guys are trying to meet their 30 by 30 goal — so 30% of ocean and land protected by 2030 — something else that Aotearoa is dismally failing at. Palau has, I know, a fishing sanctuary across 80% of its exclusive economic zone, which is about half a million square kilometres. Whereas Chile and Portugal have continued to expand their zones

(Brianne)
and now they are protecting over 30% of their national waters. Now it is worth noting that the level of protections vary, right? High protection and protection are surprisingly different.

(Kate)
I was about to ask you for dummies, like tell me what protection means, because you’re saying no fishing, I mean that lines up, there’s a place for them to breed, but what else does protection mean?

(Brianne)
It very much depends. The UK says they have marine protected areas, but then they’ve just said, hey, we’re going to stop bottom trawling in some of our areas. And I thought, great, conclusion — but it turns out they’re going to start bottom trawling in some of their marine protected areas.

(Kate)
So they’re saying these areas are protected. And they’re still doing it.

(Brianne)
But they’re still bottom trawling, which is one of the most destructive things you can do. Like it’s farcical, but that’s fine.

(Kate)
Okay, so quite a range. Protection’s a bit loose, but we don’t want greenwashing of protection. Like where do you find this information?

(Brianne)
I do a lot of research, man. Yeah.

(Kate)
But it’s not necessarily easily found.

(Brianne)
I’ll put some stuff in the show notes for people to go and have a look at, for updated ocean news.

(Kate)
I guess I’m just like, who reports on that? Do you know what I mean? Like if New Zealand did do more in the way of ocean protection, would that be — like who’s in charge of…?

(Brianne)
WWF is a great source — obviously I’m biased as a board member — but legitimately a very useful, non-biased, straight-down-the-line source.

(Kate)
Yeah, cool.

(Brianne)
Boffa Miskell is bloody fabulous. There’s lots of stuff going on in Northland, Marlborough and Taranaki; they’re doing a whole bunch of kelp reforestation projects. So kelp can grow up to half a metre, if not more, in a day. It’s mad. And when you have kelp, you then get filter feeders, you get cleaner oceans in a matter of days.

(Brianne)
Like it’s phenomenally quick. These are iwi-led reforestation projects and they’re focusing on native species that we’re starting to lose and they’re massively successful — 240% increase in kelp coverage.

(Kate)
Wow.

(Brianne)
And they’re also removing kina, which are obviously problematic in massive numbers. So it’s pretty cool. That goes to show what happens when you combine indigenous marine management and scientific monitoring.

(Kate)
Yeah, I can’t believe that.

(Brianne)
It’s very cool. Now, I have a bajillion good news stories, but also, there’s only so much good news you want. Like, ugh, let’s go back to the regularly scheduled pessimism, please. No, I’m not kidding.

(Brianne)
But I am giving away a copy of Rewilding the Sea by Charles Clover to somebody out there right now. So head over to Instagram to enter and you will find all you need. It’s actually a really interesting book and quite a good insight into what rewilding the sea would look like. And it might even make you want to be a seaweed farmer because I actually would quite like to do that.

(Brianne)
So, do you feel better about the state of the world?
The answer is yes.

(Kate)
Yes. The reason for the dramatic pause is yes, but I want — you know, there’s some great newsletters out there. Do we have — I’m just thinking, isn’t there like an Instagram, is there a place? And maybe there are that share positive news stories.

(Brianne)
Oh my god, yes. Like Elena — I can’t think of her last name. Don’t ask me names of people off the top of my head. This is what we’ve learned. I’m terrible. There’s lots of good news. So there’s Elena, she’s the climate change and waste educator online. I’ll put her in the show notes. There’s that Sam guy. Yes, no, I don’t know either.

(Brianne)
I will put a whole bunch of them in the show notes

(Kate)
so people can have a look, because it is really important to feel happier about going online, knowing that there’s some positive things out there.

(Kate)
Totally. Yeah, honestly, keep them coming. That was great. I feel much better about the world for my children and for myself.

(Brianne)
And hopefully she’s not even making that up, folks.

(Kate)
No.

(Brianne)
Thank you for joining me.

(Kate)
No worries.

(Brianne)
On the pod.

(Brianne)
We will see you — well, Microgreens this week will be on more about ocean health and some of the good stuff going on. She’s a big fan of the ocean. A big deep dive, as it were. Wow.

(Brianne)
That’s a very AI phrase, which is absolutely ruined for me. I cannot bear AI.

(Brianne)
Anyway, we’ll see you next time. Kia ora, kaitiaki.

(Kate)
Ciao.

(Brianne)
And there you go. I hope you learned something and realised that being green isn’t about everything in your pantry matching with those silly glass jars or living in a commune. If that’s your jam, fabulous. But sustainability at its heart is just using what you need. If you enjoyed this episode, please don’t keep it to yourself and feel free to drop me a rating and hit the subscribe button.

(Brianne)
Kia ora and I’ll see you next week.