Three fishers sit around a bare table in Pätea Boating Club, a few hundred metres back from New Zealand's South Taranaki coastline. Pigeons have left droppings on the floorboards, and through the salt-dusted windows the ocean pounds against the black sand.
"This is one of the best fishing areas in the country," the club's commodore, Steve Corrigan, said of the South Taranaki bight, which sweeps along the vast west coast of the North Island.
"And it's at risk of being ruined." Aside from its abundant fish species, the bight is home to rocky reefs, New Zealand pygmy blue whales and is visited by endangered species such as the Maui dolphin, the world's rarest. But over the past 11 years the region's seafloor has generated global interest and become a bitter battleground between a mining company and locals who live and work along the coast.
Since 2013, Trans-Tasman Resources (TTR) has been trying to gain consent to mine the iron sands between 19 and 42 metres below the surface. Iron sands are rich in rare earth minerals used in the production of steel, batteries and spacecraft - and increasingly soughtafter for renewable energy.
TTR's proposal to mine up to 50m tonnes a year for 35 years has created a years-long legal dispute with the community, which fears the sediment discharged back into the sea will smother marine life, impact fishing and endanger rare marine mammals.
The fight against seabed mining in the politically conservative Taranaki region is galvanising unlikely bedfellows dairy farmers, boaties, surfers, schools, iwi (Māori tribes) and environmental groups are working together to block the proposal.
"I don't think any of us would call us greenies," said Phil Morgan, a former dairy farmer and avid fisher. "We're pro-business... but this [area] is far too important to wreck."
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Finn family murals
The optimism that runs through Finnish artist Tove Jansson's Moomin stories also appears in her public works, now on show in a Helsinki exhibition
I hoped Finland would be a progressive dream.I've had to think again Mike Watson
Oulu is five hours north from Helsinki by train and a good deal colder and darker each winter than the Finnish capital. From November to March its 220,000 residents are lucky to see daylight for a couple of hours a day and temperatures can reach the minus 30s. However, this is not the reason I sense a darkening of the Finnish dream that brought me here six years ago.
A surplus of billionaires is destabilising our democracies Zoe Williams
The concept of \"elite overproduction\" was developed by social scientist Peter Turchin around the turn of this century to describe something specific: too many rich people for not enough rich-person jobs.
'What will people think? I don't care any more'
At 90, Alan Bennett has written a sex-fuelled novella set in a home for the elderly. He talks about mourning Maggie Smith, turning down a knighthood and what he makes of the new UK prime minister
I see you
What happens when people with acute psychosis meet the voices in their heads? A new clinical trial reveals some surprising results
Rumbled How Ali ran rings around apartheid, 50 years ago
Fifty years ago, in a corner of white South Africa, Muhammad Ali already seemed a miracle-maker.
Trudeau faces 'iceberg revolt'as calls grow for PM to quit
Justin Trudeau, who promised “sunny ways” as he won an election on a wave of public fatigue with an incumbent Conservative government, is now facing his darkest and most uncertain political moment as he attempts to defy the odds to win a rare fourth term.
Lost Maya city revealed through laser mapping
After swapping machetes and binoculars for computer screens and laser mapping, a team of researchers have discovered a lost Maya city containing temple pyramids, enclosed plazas and a reservoir which had been hidden for centuries by the Mexican jungle.
'A civil war' Gangs step up assault on capital
Armed fighters advance into neighbourhoods at the heart of Port-au-Prince as authorities try to restore order
Reality bites in the Himalayan 'kingdom of happiness'
High emigration and youth unemployment levels belie the mountain nation's global reputation for cheeriness