Historic Chatham Islands station sold to Moriori trust

One of the biggest farms on the Chatham Islands has just been sold to descendants of the Moriori people who originally occupied the islands.

Barker Bros Ltd has sold the 4116ha Kaingaroa Station, on the north end of Chatham Island, to the Hokotehi Moriori Trust, the Chatham Islander newspaper reports.

The farm has been managed by the Barker family since 1893 and contains extensive coastal landscapes, bush reserves and fresh water lakes.

The station surrounds the J. M. Barker Hapupu National Historic Reserve, which contains many of the surviving dendroglyphs known as rakau momori (Moriori tree carvings).

The dendroglyphs are in a 33ha kopi (karaka) forest, which was fenced off only in 1980 after it was gifted to the Crown a year earlier.

The deal also included the strategically sited Kaingaroa fish processing factory and wharf, leased to Chatham Processing, a subsidiary of the Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Commission.

Hokotehi Moriori Trust chairman Alfred Preece told the newspaper that the purchase of the farm was a vital part of the renaissance of Moriori culture.

It would boost the ability of Moriori to stand tall in their homeland of Rekohu (Chatham Islands).

The trust had been impressed by the willingness of the Barker family to acknowledge the status of Moriori as the Tchakat Henu (original people) of the island.

A spokesman for the Barker family said it was pleased Kaingaroa was returning to the Moriori owners, who would continue to conserve the special features of the station.

"We have enjoyed our connection with Kaingaroa and the Chatham Islands community over the last 110 years," said the spokesman.

The Hokotehi Moriori Trust will take possession in June.

The Kaingaroa property is where Lieutenant William Broughton of the brig Chatham first landed in 1791, the first recorded contact with Moriori, who had called the islands their home for 500 years.

- NZPA