They are purveyors of some of the world’s most sought-after culinary delicacies, but Mahurangi’s oyster farmers have been reduced to eating beans on toast most days, their hair going grey, and their nerves shot.
Last month, the farmers were hit with a livelihood-ruining sewage overflow after a power surge at a new wastewater treatment plant in Warkworth.
The overflow of 1200 cubic metres prevented farmers from collecting oysters for 28 days.
On Wednesday, a $1 million compensation deal was struck, but the 10 farmers say $100,000 each is only a drop in the sewage-polluted ocean compared to what they’ve lost.
Jim Aitken from Mahurangi Oysters was hauling in contaminated oysters on Thursday from his farm in the Mahurangi Harbour, north of Auckland, to see if they were still alive.
“We probably have somewhere around 80,000 to 120,000 dozen oysters and they’re all contaminated, every single one is contaminated.
“They can flush it out, but again it takes time, it takes that 28 days if the test results come back negative, but still everything stops.”
While he is relieved and grateful for the compensation from Watercare, he said it will only cover a small portion of the damage to his business.
“Pretty much it’s all gone already to pay off our debts, but it’ll get us through to Christmas, so it takes a significant weight off the shoulders so we’re very thankful that we have got some support after this very, very tough year.”
Aitken said he has lost a whole year of income and incurred debt just trying to survive.
“It has been a bit of eat beans on toast, trying to keep the wallet tight, because we don’t know what next year is going to bring, until that new main pipe is put in there might still be spills next winter, so until that’s in we could be in for another difficult season for 2026.”
The toll on his business will likely linger across the next three years.
Up the road in Matakana, Tom Waters has been spending thousands on oysters from elsewhere just to keep his businesses running.
He said despite no-one getting ill in the latest discharge, the reputation of his business, Matakana Oysters, has taken a huge blow.
“This has really damaged the reputation again so financially that’s a huge impact.
“I’ve got people saying ‘oh look we’re just not going to be trusting them’, all of the farmers have had that out there wherever they sell at farmers markets or wholesalers, that’s something that we’re going to have to continuously try and work hard to get back again.”
Waters said he has had countless sleepless nights with the stress of keeping up with bills and trying to keep on staff.
“This event the other day, that one really did hit me quite badly because it was sunny and we were starting to get everything back going again so I’m glad that they were on the front foot and have come through with something for us in this regard because in previous times it’s sort of been like you’re banging your head upon a brick wall.”
He said compensation is a good start for now, but he is nervous about wet weather events in the future.
“Even though Watercare have done work to try and mitigate those effects with their temporary fixes around Warkworth and certain areas, we are still going to have this problem until the growth service pipeline goes in at the end of next year or the year after.”
Aquaculture New Zealand, the New Zealand Oyster Industry Association and Watercare are still figuring out the full extent of loss from Watercare’s system failures.
By Bella Craig of rnz.co.nz
