Black Tuesday
Released 24 Feb 2011
By Don Nicolson, Federated Farmers President
It's hard feeling so helpless as I write from the biennial Paris International Agricultural Show. Completely numb, I stare into monitors playing CNN and on Wednesday, French farmers extended their heartfelt sympathy to all those affected. In my thanks I had to swallow hard such is the emotion I now feel. In my adult life this disaster ranks with Erebus in 1979. Everyone will reference to ‘where you were.' This earthquake is a tragedy in the rawest sense of the word for while Erebus was an accident, Christchurch is nature. While one was preventable this earthquake was inevitable. It all became a question of when, where and how large.
This is a very different earthquake for rural Christchurch. Last September, North Canterbury's farms were wrecked as fields were cleaved or suffered from liquefaction. It is awe inspiring to see once mighty grain silos crushed like a soft drink can. Last September, it was the rural community who were badly affected but this time, it's our garden city. While rural Banks Peninsula was the epicentre it happens to be an extinct volcano. Yes there is some damage to farms, homes and roads but its nothing compared to Christchurch. The epicentre started under tough volcanic rock but found its terrible expression in Christchurch's once swampy soil.
While I sat stunned watching these graphic images in Europe, Federated Farmers had swung into action. Our rural people are the most isolated and the most distant so we need to look out for them. It was with some relief that after torturous and worrying attempts, we finally made contact with a goodly number to form a clear picture. While shaken there was a realisation that raw nature had struck Christchurch.
But at times like this farmers can come to a cities aid.
As a farmer you know the three basics of life - water, food and of course, shelter. Given the destruction to Christchurch's water supply, Federated Farmers worked with Fonterra Cooperative Group to get 200,000 litres of drinking water into the city. Individual water tanker owners have called in offering tens of thousands more in an effort that must be sustained. Federated Farmers has made an open request for spare portable water tanks to spread these bulk supplies and to help meet stock water needs in Banks Peninsula, where town supply has failed. Yet I'm inspired by the three Canterbury provinces of Federated Farmers.
These ‘red and blacks' wish to accommodate fellow Cantabrians and rescue workers in Canterbury. They don't want an evacuation to Dunedin, Wellington, or Auckland, but to keep the community together in rural Canterbury. Working with Fonterra, the Red Cross and Civil Defence, we've got scores of accommodation pledges. Federated Farmers members are working with rural sport clubs to transform these into relief centres. These clubs all offer working sanitation, water and electricity and could help relieve pressure on the city. It's also humbling to hear that farmers from the Waikato to South Otago are offering meat despite beef and sheep farmers just coming out of lean times. It may sound old fashioned but these farmers are offering the shirt off their backs. That's community. There are also other key areas where farmers expertise can make a difference in the coming weeks. Yet the biggest message Canterbury's farmers are sending is a will to keep the Christchurch family together.
I know some of us will have someone who has lost their life or be close to those who have lost life. This emergency underlines we are all one people underneath our skin and is why I want to come home
