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16-05-2023
WELLINGTON: The New Zealand government is allocating NZ$1.1bn to help communities recover from Cyclone Gabrielle and flooding.
The funds from the 2023 budget are to cover “basics” of rebuilding roads, rail and schools, as well as flood protection, the government announced on Sunday.
Cyclone Gabrielle devastated parts of the North Island in February, killing 11, after flash floods prompted by record-breaking rainfall hit the biggest city, Auckland, in January.
“At budget 2023, the government is investing $941m total operating and $195m capital in the next stage of the recovery,” a statement said.
The government has estimated the cost of the disasters at up to NZ$14.5bn, the country’s costliest disaster after the 2011 Canterbury earthquakes that severely damaged the city of Christchurch.
“The recovery package responds to the immediate recovery needs of today and invests in greater resilience for tomorrow,” the prime minister, Chris Hipkins, said.
The spending “will get roads, rail and schools back to where they were before the extreme weather hit this year so communities can get back to normal as soon as possible”.
Amid pressure from the main opposition party, centre-right National, the government has said it will not introduce any major new taxes to fund recovery in this year’s budget, to be delivered on Thursday.
In addition to recovery, the funding was earmarked for child mental health support in the hard-hit Hawkes Bay and Tairawhiti regions, jobs training and flood protection, the government said.
Gabrielle, which hit the North Island’s northernmost region and tracked down the east coast, caused widespread destruction.
Insurance companies in March reported receiving 40,000 claims worth around NZ$890m for damage from the cyclone.
wo months after a cyclone swept away thousands of beehives in the fertile fruit bowl of New Zealand’s North Island and left thousands more unreachable, beekeepers are facing a painful and costly recovery that has prompted questions of how they will adapt to the intensifying climate crisis.
When Cyclone Gabrielle roared across the North Island in February, killing 11 people and wreaking billions of dollars in damage, it tore apart the orchards and vineyards of Hawke’s Bay and the East Coast where pip fruit, kiwifruit and wine are export earners and destroyed 5,000 to 6,000 of the beehives that pollinate them. It represented “severity and damage that … has not been experienced in a generation”, the prime minister, Chris Hipkins, said. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
