As the first Māori and Pacific led community recycling centre in Aotearoa, the Onehunga Community Recycling Centre is taking an inter-generational approach to climate action.
In February 2022, Foundation North approved a multi-year grant to support Onehunga Zero Waste in the creation and implementation of a local community recycling centre. We sat down with Ron Muavae, one of the creators of the Onehunga Community Recycling Centre (OCRC) to hear the story behind this unique kaupapa.
“Being Māori Pasifika, we come from the land, we’re always taught from day one to look after that – to be kaitiaki for the land.”
The Onehunga Community Recycling Centre (OCRC) is a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to climate action. Spearheaded by locals, the centre opened in August of 2022 through the partnering of Synergy Projects Trust and Localised. Recycling services are just one of the offerings the OCRC engages in to promote individual and collective climate action within the community – their base in Onehunga serves as an education hub, repurposing workshop, and second-hand store.
However, when you visit the centre today – you would never guess it was once the site of a major rubbish dump.
In the comfort of the Centre’s cosy coffee corner, Ron shares, “The history of this place was a landfill,” adding that, before it was a landfill, “This used to be a beach, this whole area, and many people fished down here, the many tribes that came from this place lost that taonga [when it was turned into landfill] so when this opportunity came up, it was a way that we could work with mana whenua to reclaim what was lost.”
“When people come here, we always tell the story of this place. When I asked mana whenua ‘how can we repair all the hurt, the mamae?’ they told us to tell the story as it is, tell the truth and don’t butter it up.”
Ron goes on to share, “This is one way we can utilise something that was negative and turn it into a positive outcome – and at the same time be changing our community’s mindset about how to do things better, and not to repeat these same mistakes.”
When asked about how a once-neglected rubbish dump became the home of a recycling and climate action education hub, he says, “The whole idea for this place came about through young people and their questions – asking about the coloured bins and where their rubbish goes.”
In response to the questions and visions of the Onehunga and Oranga youth, and in embarking on the journey through collective climate action, the OCRC team knew they needed to lean into their Māori and Pacific roots to find innovative solutions that engage the community.
“Being Māori and Pasifika, we are trying to engage our people to get behind this mahi, because it’s really important for them to understand that we have some old skills and trades that our mama and papas and nanas can transfer to us, while also utilising the tools of the Pākehā – combining them together to come up with innovative ways of doing things.”
“It’s about finding ways to reuse so there’s minimal waste – we didn’t have landfill back in those days – we simply learnt how to recycle everything we had.”
Speaking to the educational and volunteering opportunities the OCRC offers the community, Ron shares more on the importance of connecting with and engaging the local community for collective action,
“We engage a lot with our community because we want our young people to come through here all the time to learn and hopefully come up with better ways of doing things.”
“It’s just a matter of providing a platform – and that’s why this place is so special, it’s a place to be free to think, design, come up with great ideas and engage. We always wanted to make it feel cool, make recycling cool, rather than a boring chore.”
Touching on how the local youth have received the recycling centre and its opportunities, Ron says, “They’re the ones that instigated a lot of this mahi. Working with these young people they come up with some crazy ideas, but great ideas – the problem we saw back in those days, there were no places for them to go and learn and create, and we wanted to give them a place where they could excel.”
“This is a place where they can feel free and not have to say we don’t have enough money or resources. It’s always been in our DNA for us to really work with young people - I mean half our work here is done by youth, and through our negotiations with council that was something big that they asked, they understood that some of these problems could be fixed by these young people.”
When asked about whether or not Ron and the team have noticed changes in the community since opening the centre, he shares, “There’s definitely been a change in behaviour. People used to grab a trailer and drive down to [the local landfill] to throw their stuff out, but now they’re becoming more aware that by reusing and repurposing some of the stuff they’d normally take to the dump, they save money – that’s a big driver.”
“When they hear the story of this place and see the impact of what we do - and they know the impact of what they’re now doing – you’ve got them for life and that’s a mindset and a change we really like seeing.”
He adds, “We’re starting to get a following now, we’ve got people coming all the way from the shore!”
Opening a recycling centre doesn’t happen overnight, and in keeping their community focus, the OCRC leaned into a community of their own to learn about what it means to be a community recycling centre…
“The other community recycling centres all came behind us, supported us, and helped us build not only our capacity, but our knowledge,” says Ron, adding, “Our partner here, Localised, really gave us that back-end support so we could focus on learning how to look after this place and its people.”
The OCRC team refuse to slow down, last year they were selected to be on the Auckland Council Deconstruction Panel – a combined initiative between the Council and Contractors that aims to ensure materials from storm-affected properties are reused and recycled to avoid landfill.
To take part in this initiative, staff undertook comprehensive training, receiving their Impac Prequal certification and Tōtika approval to ensure the team were site ready.
Foundation North is proud to support the Onehunga Community Recycling Centre in their mahi engaging with local communities and stakeholders for collective climate action.
