Supporting grassroots innovation at the edge of the map.
For a week in March, the Edmund Hillary Fellowship community held its third Impact Springboard virtual conference. With topics ranging from blockchain applications to mental health to decarbonizing transport, Fellows were given the opportunity to support each other’s initiatives and to dive deep into some of our biggest global challenges.
One of the key focus areas explored was indigenous development: the barriers to its success and how Māori values can be embedded into Aotearoa’s business practices and aspirations to better support initiatives which may not fit comfortably into a traditional investment portfolio. The Springboard provided, a spotlight on the mahi of Lily Stender (Cohort 6) at Tolaga Bay Innovation. What followed was both a show of gratitude for the EHF community and an ask for further support for her challenging work in this remote region of Te Ika-a-Māui’s east coast.
The daughter of a Māori mother and German father, Lily describes herself as being “born in both worlds.” Growing up in Christchurch, Lily says that she never got the opportunity to wholly know or experience her Māori culture. So when the iconic inn in their mother’s hometown of Uawa Tolaga Bay went up for sale in 2011, Lily embraced her brother’s decision to buy it and return the family to their mother’s homeland.
Despite having no experience of operating a hotel, Lily took on the challenge of running Tolaga Bay Inn and has since transformed it into a social enterprise which now houses Tolaga Bay Innovation. With support from the Ministry of Social Development, Lily has created an incubator for grass-roots businesses, enabling them to bypass agencies and red tape and providing them with much-needed start-up funding and wraparound support. The kaupapa of Tolaga Bay Innovation is to empower the Māori community to become masters of their own destinies through education and business incubation. By working with local residents to create initiatives which monetise their existing skills and capabilities, Lily is helping to restore some economic security in a rural region where earning opportunities are sparse.
“My passion was in community activities and engagement more than hospitality and tourism,” she says. “Getting my Mum back to the homeland was the main thing. And then, after that, utilising the Inn as a vehicle for economic development. The statistics around poverty, unemployment and social issues are far too high in this region. I needed to find ways to really help our people here. So we created the Tolaga Bay Inn Charitable Trust to help drive our social enterprise aspirations and transfer the Inn into an intergenerational community asset. As kaitiaki, it is our responsibility to look after our people, land and environment for future generations. That’s how Māori and indigenous nations think.”
The problems that Lily is addressing with Tolaga Bay Innovation are deeply rooted and systemic, she says. “The challenges you see here are ones of injustice which date back to colonisation. People are still suffering from it through poverty, unemployment, low-skilled jobs and poor education. We’re not taught to be entrepreneurs. We’re not taught how money works. The whole system needs overturning through the self-empowerment and self-determination of our communities. We’re intelligent. We have skills. We know the solutions to our problems. We just need support to execute these solutions.”
Lily’s drive for social justice and change came from her mother, she says. “She was always a fighter of inequality and an advocate for the underdogs. I watched as our beautiful people and whānau struggled for so long and I learned how to turn that anger and frustration into a motivator.” With incredible tenacity and a bit of luck, Lily eventually met Amanda Nicolle (who Lily refers to as her “eagle”) from the Ministry of Social Development through the Social Enterprise World Forum. Amanda understood what Lily was trying to achieve and, with her support, Lily was able to work with MSD to launch a 12-month pilot programme.
By creating an ecosystem of Māori entrepreneurs, Lily is helping the Tolaga Bay community to build self-sustaining livelihoods and purpose, combatting what she describes as a sometimes disheartening relentlessness of need and suffering in our Māori communities. “We helped 12 businesses launch in our pilot programme. The range of the work they’re doing is huge: a fruit and veg delivery business, a Māori massage and sport injury clinic, an online clothing shop and a native nursery. And what we’re seeing through these businesses is that skilled work helps to restore the mana within; to eliminate those stereotypes of being lazy dole bludgers or even criminals.
We’re just the underdogs who have seen our whānau suffering for too long.” She also highlights that several of Tolaga Bay Innovation’s founders are single parents, reinforcing the intergenerational value of her mahi. “Sure, some of us are solo parents doing it on our own. But if we show the kids we can do it, we can break that cycle of dependency.”
Lily rightly describes Tolaga Bay Innovation as having gone from strength to strength, but acknowledges that it was a battle to get it off the ground. “No one wanted to support us at first. I knocked on door after door of philanthropic organisations, investors and government agencies. And there was always some reason why we were the wrong fit. Either they didn’t want to align themselves with us because the Inn sells alcohol or they wanted matched funding we couldn’t provide or they wanted a guaranteed quick return on an investment. There were so many barriers we just couldn’t push through; I realised that these systems simply aren’t set up to support anything that sits outside business as usual.”
Lily joined EHF as a Fellow to expand her networks and amp up her impact at Tolaga Bay Innovation. She is now collaborating with EHF Fellows in working groups to reach her next milestone stage. Lily is effusively grateful for the support that she has received through the EHF community and is eager to exchange her valuable perspective and knowledge in return. “For those who are struggling to connect in Aotearoa, reach out to your local Māori communities. They’ll help embrace you and connect you to their regions. After you’ve done that, come and see me for some kai.
“We recently hosted 13 Fellows at Tolaga Bay and provided them with the opportunity to better understand some of our mahi and our challenges. With their ongoing support, I believe that Tolaga Bay Innovation could provide an opportunity to create real solutions for some of our systemic inequalities and then be used as a blueprint for other initiatives around Aotearoa and the world... The next step for us now is technology. We know that, in a community this small, businesses need to be trading online in order to be financially viable. So the next steps will be to improve our connectivity infrastructure and support greater digital literacy in our entrepreneurial community. We’re actively reaching out to anyone who can support us in those areas.”
50 kilometres north east of Gisborne and with a population of only 800, Lily paints Tolaga Bay as a truly unique and bicultural part of Aotearoa. “This region is a sacred place for Māori which needs to be safeguarded. We also have a bigger concentration of Māori and Pakeha living side-by-side than anywhere else in the country and, geographically, we are the first place on earth to see the sun each day. What better place could there be to sow the seeds of innovation?”
To learn more about Lily and Tolaga Bay Innovation, follow their Facebook page. Lily would also love to connect with anyone who can help support and further her mahi and can be contacted at tolagabayinn@gmail.com.