Announcement on Sustainable Business Network website
Transformational Leadership 2025 Award Winner
When Cyclones Hale and Gabrielle hit the East Coast, they left behind mountains of wood slash and damaged communities. Slash for Cash was born in Tolaga Bay as a grassroots response to this crisis. The organisation transforms hazardous wood slash into biochar and clean fuel, removing tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere while creating jobs and regenerating soil.
The core innovation is a mobile carbonisation kiln, designed to New Zealand engineering standards and protected by intellectual property rights. The kiln converts slash into biochar and smokeless charcoal briquettes.
By the end of 2026, Slash for Cash predicts it will have removed 4,320 tonnes of cyclone-damaged slash and created 720 tonnes of biochar. It expects to be sequestering between 8,640 and 12,960 tonnes of CO₂ annually from 2026.
The social impact is equally significant. A fully funded one-year job readiness programme, in partnership with the Department of Internal Affairs, has trained 18 unemployed locals in digital literacy, health and safety, solar technologies, financial skills, entrepreneurship and biochar production.
Slash for Cash has also partnered with the Eastern Institute of Technology’s Adult Community Education programme to train 53 community members in the science, production and application of biochar.
The organisation operates from the historic Tolaga Bay Inn with support from iwi and hapū. The kaupapa is grounded in mātauranga Māori.
More information
IDDS Tairāwhiti 2025 Final Report
IDDS Tairawhiti wraps up in New Zealand with six projects completed
Contact
Thabiso Mashaba, These Hands, GSSE; Slash for Cash