The Ministry for Primary Industries is the New Zealand government department charged with overseeing, managing and regulating the farming, fishing, food, animal welfare, biosecurity, and forestry sectors.
Kauri are one of the longest-living tree species in the world, living between 1000- 2000 years. Māori (the indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand) see the health of Kauri as a sign of general wellbeing, and so they are a cornerstone of the country’s remaining indigenous forests.
Phytophthora Agathidicida (also known as Kauri Dieback disease) is a fungus-like pathogen that infects and kills Kauri trees. It spreads with soil movement and there is no known cure. The only way New Zealand can save their remaining kauri forests is to contain the spread of the disease in its current locations, and stop its spread into healthy areas.
MPI, DOC (Department of Conservation) and four local councils and two regional councils had all collected Kauri Dieback data individually, in more than 100 siloed excel files. Every file was in a different format. No-one had a complete picture of where Kauri were, let alone where the Kauri Dieback disease was spreading. The project, run by DOC at the time, was going to throw away all the data collected over the previous five years and start again, which would have had a significant negative impact on the project and on the health of this extremely important tree species.
Occam developed the National Kauri Dieback data system for MPI and ran it for 12 years until Covid closed the project.
The first outcome of the Kauri Dieback project was a comprehensive map of where Kauri Dieback has been tested for and where it had been found. There is no science without data, and with data the project was given the ability to provide science to the problem.
For less than a third of the price of annual excel file storage from the incumbent provider, Occam developed a fully integrated cloud based solution providing a truly accurate view of the Kauri Dieback threat. Business as usual maps are integrated into the system, leaving scarce mapping resource to focus on exception reporting required by the scientists.
The outcome was a usable, scalable and adaptable information system, with very significant time and cost savings. New Zealand now has an authoritative source of quality information referencing more than 10,000 Kauri trees. This information can now be effectively and accurately used to map the state of Kauri Dieback disease which is something that has never been able to be achieved in the past.
“Before the Occam system, we had no idea what was happening nationally with Kauri Dieback. Once we had unified data, we were able to progress the science, which changed every year. From simple ground truthing to aerial photography, Occam kept up with the science. The outcome is millions of Kauri trees saved from the dieback disease.”
Kim Brown
National Operations Manager – Kauri Dieback
Ministry for Primary Industries
