Te Weu is involved in a range of research projects with local and national partners looking at the risks presented by increased frequency and severity of weather events in the region.
- Resilient Kaenga Project: Working with land blocks and marae to co-develop and produce tools and processes for risk assessment and response planning. The research team will be guided by local mātauranga to develop fit for purpose tools to support responses that aid in the protection and enhancement of marae communities and whenua Māori. The team will also share the tools with marae and Māori land blocks in other locations.
- Taonga and Climate Resilience Project: How can taonga help Māori communities deal with climate change? The project is working with marae and land blocks with four outcomes: (a) activating taonga to deal with the challenge of the climate crisis; (b) developing community climate resilience plans informed by taonga; (c) new taonga created to communicate climate resilience plans, and to connect to taonga used to make these plans; (d) production of resources to help other Māori communities initiate similar processes to create taonga-informed climate mitigation plans.
- Resilient And Sustainable Tai Rawhiti (RASTR): Working with a group of flood risk, environmental modelling researchers and other experts to support community-level planning in communities across Tairāwhiti.
- Deliberative Democracy for Climate Adaptation: Working with three communities in Tairāwhiti to develop case studies to be used in a series of citizen assemblies / kāhui that will identify opportunities for Gisborne District Council to support climate adaptation in the region. The purpose of this project is to: (a) document and garner lessons from case studies of how communities are recovering from Cyclone Gabrielle and planning how they can adapt and transition to a more resilient, survivable future; and (b) organise a deliberative Tairāwhiti citizen assembly/kāhui to consider expert advice and case study experience on how GDC in collaboration with private and public sector stakeholders can best facilitate and support communities to develop their own adaptation plans as well as contribute to the development of regional adaptation plans.
- Extreme Weather Events Impact on Health & Wellbeing: How should New Zealand’s health social and community systems be organised, in the context of a climate emergency? A research project being undertaken with researchers from Waipapa Taumata Rau University of Auckland that is looking at the impacts of the extreme weather events in January and February 2023 on communities in Tairawhiti and Hawkes Bay, with a focus on health and wellbeing impacts.
- He hono tāngata e kore e motu, kāpā he taura waka e motu: Assessing the impacts of public lifelines loss on Māori communities in Te Tairāwhiti. What were the impacts during and after Cyclone Gabrielle on Māori communities in the Te Tairāwhiti region of bridges collapsing, roads being flooded or washed away, power cuts and telecommunications going down for several days and weeks in some cases? The Project is undertaking surveys and interviews with residents, business owners, marae trustees, farmers, forestry workers, health professionals, and other groups across different age and geographic groupings to investigate the following: (a) how the loss of connections impacted their whānau and community; (b) what they see as the ongoing risks of similar loss will be; (c) whether there were any positive impacts from these disconnections; (d) what options they can identify for reducing the likelihood and severity of disconnections and associated negative impacts from similar events in the future.
Te Weu Tairāwhiti 
Good to know something like this is in the offing.
Can I be kept up to date with the Progress of this Kaupapa
I live in an area that is truly at the Mercy of the elements
The Weather is becoming scary during these big events
My Family runs an Organic food growing operation and we were expanding into Orchards etc as well as what we normally grow
These rains have brought everything to a stop
I planted Orchards which normally thrive in this climate,but the continual rain and no Summer are causing things to drown
The Water table is way out of sync and hasn’t settled to it’s normal seasonal levels since 2021
The real big rain events plus these Cyclone are the rotten icing on the cake
Yes the actual weather is doing damage across board
There is a new Phobia which wasn’t there or noticable before 2 years ago
Rain anxiety amongst the Masses
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