Turning Māori business aspirations into reality

The Rakahinonga Roadshow created by Tapuwae Roa is heading to Tairāwhiti to help ignite Māori entrepreneurship.

Facilitated by business mentor Saara Tawha, of Ramaroa Ltd, and Amy McLean, founder of Te Kainga Wāhine, the aims of the interactive one-day wānanga are to inspire Māori rakahinonga (entrepreneurship) and provide participants with key tools and skills to progress their business ideas into reality.

“In our November roadshows we saw the hunger in our communities to forge their own futures in business,” Tapuwae Roa kaihautu (chief executive) Te Puoho Katene said.

“These are designed to introduce aspiring Māori entrepreneurs to tools and resources to help bring those aspirations into reality.”

“Distance is still a barrier to many of our people.

“Hosting a roadshow online allows us to cast the net wider into our communities.”

Tapuwae Roa is a leading Māori social impact organisation formed from the Māori Fisheries Settlement that funds, invests, delivers and advocates for targeted social change in leadership development, education and training, as well as STEMM (science, technology, engineering, maths and mātauranga) for all Māori across Aotearoa.

The Rakahinonga roadshows are part of Tapuwae Roa’s focus on supporting the economic resilience and independence of Māori.

“Māori are highly entrepreneurial but being a founder or business owner is difficult, and often a lonely journey,” Mr Katene said.

“For those who aspire to become founders, these roadshows present a suite of tools, resources and knowledge that can help them on that journey, as well as create a local community of peers going through the same experience.”

On Saturday, February 17, the Gisborne Tairāwhiti roadshow will be held at Tāiki E! in Treble Court. There is no charge to attend the wānanga but registration online is required at www.tapuwaeroa.org/rakahinonga

It will be the first time the roadshow has been held in Tairāwhiti although they have supported kaupapa here such as Tāiki E! and Tōnui Colab through grants from Tapuwae Roa in previous years.

“We are being hosted by Tāiki E!, with Cain Kerehoma and Renay Charteris being great supporters of this kaupapa. Tairāwhiti has a strong innovation scene and we hope to tap into that during our roadshow,” he said.

“As a national pan-Māori organisation, we know that for kaupapa to be effective, we need to go to where our people are, and that’s not just in the big cities.”

“Building on from the success of last year’s roadshows in Whangārei, Auckland, Hamilton, and Dunedin, we are excited to now visit Gisborne and Otaki, as well as provide an online wānanga for those who cannot attend in person.”

The aim of the wānanga is to help foster and support the entrepreneurial brilliance that lies in the whakapapa of our people, he said.

“We hope that through providing these support mechanisms, our Rakahinonga Māori feel empowered to take on the world with their ideas.

“We hope to have a full wānanga with passionate and hungry local attendees ready to iterate and develop their own whakaaro while supporting and challenging those of their peers.

“If attendees leave this wānanga believing in themselves, that they can start their own business, that they can take control of their economic fates, that is success for us.”