Hawke's Bay gets a $420,000 natural disaster resilience boost

(L-R) Ian MacDonald, Lisa Pearse, Natasha Goldring, Kris Faafoi, Bill Dalton, Rachel Schicker and Karl Wairama at the funding announcement. Photo / Supplied

Hawke's Bay has been given a $420,000 boost in funds to help prepare for major natural disasters.

The funding was announced by Civil Defence Minister Kris Faafoi, who visited Napier on Thursday.

The money will go to Hawke's Bay Civil Defense and the East Coast Life at the Boundary, for projects designed to keep people and communities safer.

Hawke's Bay's Civil Defence's group manager Ian Macdonald said the projects were part of the group's ongoing efforts to increase Hawke's Bay's resilience to natural hazards, in particular tsunamis.

"We've only recently come to realise how significant the tsunami risk is to Hawke's Bay and the North Island's east coast," Macdonald said.

"We've been working with our local community and other civil defence emergency management groups to fully understand the implications for our region and the rest of New Zealand.

"This funding will allow us to continue to better identify and understand these and other risks, and to prepare for, respond to and recover from emergencies."

The funding is going to three projects, one investigating how the agencies will react to an earthquake on the Hikurangi subduction zone and another on the promoting tsunami awareness in Hawke's Bay.

The third, "Te Ara o Tawhaki – A pathway to resilience indicators", is a kaupapa Māori initiative aims to understand and engage communities and measure changes to their resilience using the New Zealand resilience index, previous research and pūrākau (traditional Māori stories).

Macdonald said the projects would support communities to prepare for and respond to natural hazards.

"As one of New Zealand's most at-risk regions, it is vital our communities can adapt to and recover from events in a short amount of time, and as agencies, we are prepared."

He said people needed to understand the risks and make a plan.

"I encourage everyone to make a plan with whanau and friends, check their tsunami evacuation zones, and practice their drop cover hold and tsunami hīkoi (walk)."

In total $670,000 was given to eight projects across New Zealand.

Faafoi said the grants enable innovation.

"These grants will enable innovative, collaborative initiatives to happen, providing the sector with better tools to help keep Kiwi communities safe."