Organic certification

It was always a dream of ours to become organic certified right from the moment we decided to grow botanicals back in 2017.  We wanted to create natural products from our land, that were free from harmful chemicals.

Choosing an organic certifier  The first organic agency we joined was  Organic farm N.Z   We then moved to BIO GRO in 2023 and became fully certified with them.

Planting mānuka seeds in 2018  Our first plantation we grew was mānuka trees. Growing mānuka seedlings by hand is hard work! I remember how my back ached from the constant bending over and planting the small seeds into pots.

The seedlings began to sprout and grow.  After they were large enough the seedlings  were than planted into the ground.  All 20,000 were planted by hand.

No pesticides A few weeks after planting we realised we needed solutions around weed control.  We tried a certified organic weed spray but that was not effective.  We went with the good old way of weeding by hand, but I must tell you this job is not for the faint of heart!.

The trees grow  Once the trees became established they began to thrive.  We switched from hand weeding to mowing between the plantation rows.

New Ecosystem Over the years our mānuka plantation began to alter our environment to create a new ecosystem around us.

The air outside started to smell more like mānuka trees and underneath the mānuka plantation, kawakawa seedlings began to sprout.  We are able to take these kawakawa seedlings and replant them in our organic kawakawa plantation.

Added plantations We have evolved over the years by adding in more native botanical stands.  We now have  kumarahou, horopito, kānuka and kawakawa stands.  These native plants provide us with the much needed ingredients that enable us to create our products.

2024 This year we have become internationally certified organic, this means that we can sell our native herbs and organic products overseas as certified organic.