This time last year, everything ground to a halt. Telecommunications and electricity were down for weeks in some areas. It was a long time before the damage could be fully understood, and to date, some places still have not recovered or been rebuilt. They are still at risk, should there be heavy rainfall, be that from a lack of restored access or simply the permanent change in the landscape from Cyclone Gabrielle’s fury.

I would like to take a moment in this article to acknowledge everyone who lost a home, livelihood, or worse, a loved one, in this event. The impact the storm had was quite literally unprecedented and it is my hope we will not face an event like this again; and if we do, it is my hope we will have resilience planning in place (as a nation, a community, as businesses and individuals) to stay connected in the moment and recover quickly afterward.

We had, ironically, just revised our annual business continuity plan (BCP) when the storm hit. Even as prepared as we thought we were with our working from home arrangements in a post-covid world, our BCP ended up failing in the wake of total, extended loss of power and communication. Our office was unaffected outside of losing power – but the building locks electronically, and once those back up batteries faded heading into the 2nd day, we had no way in. Many backup security battery systems can run on anything from a 15-minute backup, for your average power blip, with more grunty models capable of around 8-12 hours before they too are exhausted. Our own solar energy system was remotely put to sleep, as the last thing the lines company desires is to have 35 kWh of power being locally generated when the lines are down and need remediation by a utility crew.[i]

As many did, we quickly set up additional resilience measures like obtaining permanent petrol powered generators (with UPS batteries to protect sensitive IT equipment), setting up emergency business hubs with Starlink internet on both the Napier and Hastings side of the bridges, creating up a business-wide WhatsApp which could be used for check-ins, independent of the failing telecommunications network.

On a grander scale, New Zealand has had to figure out the same failings. What happens when everything is down? How were we so dependent on horizontal infrastructure, and how can we move away from this as climate change drives more extreme weather events? Reflection is one part of the equation. We must also apply these learnings for the future.

Items like enabling communication must be prioritised. We took steps as soon as we could to inform our clients of our situation, and kept them updated on the steps we were taking to ensure we could keep things as “business as usual” as possible. However, these communications depended entirely on if our clients were in areas with cellular reception. Services like Starlink are more important than ever to update our spotty cellular infrastructure. Notably, One NZ has since adopted the technology, rolling out Starlink-connected services for customers from late 2024.[ii]

Additional resiliency measures taken include the Government, through MBIE, creating community hubs throughout Hawke’s Bay that are high and dry from flood risk with sufficient batteries and solar production for many days of power coupled with telecommunication services.[iii]

It pays (often literally) to be as prepared as possible, both in finance and in life. There’s always a chance something completely unexpected will happen, though, which will highlight gaps in your planning. This is the same in business, and in life. We can’t say, “This will never happen again” or “it’ll never be worse than this”. World and local events occur, client goals and objectives change, and so does a good financial plan.

In the financial advice industry, we are all about planning for the unexpected - and more importantly, the uncontrollable. Whether through insurance or robust portfolio diversification, identifying and mitigating risk in ways we can control is essential for our long-term success.

We cannot predict the future. We can certainly learn from the past and act on areas susceptible to risk. For weather-proofing, this might look like kicking our national habit of developing housing on floodplains, building core infrastructure for the once in a hundred year event that seems to come every decade, and renewed commitment from the Government to our climate agreements in an effort to slow climate change.[iv] The resilience of the New Zealand people in the face of Cyclone Gabrielle has been incredible to be part of and to watch. Now we just need more resilient systems to match.

by Nick Stewart (CEO and Financial Adviser at Stewart Group)

●     Nick Stewart (Ngāi Tahu, Ngāti Huirapa, Ngāti Māmoe, Ngāti Waitaha) is a Financial Adviser and CEO at Stewart Group, a Hawke's Bay-based CEFEX & BCorp certified financial planning and advisory firm. Stewart Group provides personal fiduciary services, Wealth Management, Risk Insurance & KiwiSaver scheme solutions. Article no. 342.

●     The information provided, or any opinions expressed in this article, are of a general nature only and should not be construed or relied on as a recommendation to invest in a financial product or class of financial products. You should seek financial advice specific to your circumstances from a Financial Adviser before making any financial decisions. A disclosure statement can be obtained free of charge by calling 0800 878 961 or visit our website, www.stewartgroup.co.nz

[i] https://lightforce.co.nz/customer-centre/what-happens-in-a-power-outage/#:~:text=Scenario%201%3A%20Grid%2Dtied%20solar,working%20on%20the%20power%20lines.

[ii] https://one.nz/why-choose-us/spacex/

[iii] https://baybuzz.co.nz/new-solar-powered-emergency-hub/

[iv] https://theconversation.com/one-year-on-from-cyclone-gabrielle-nz-still-needs-a-plan-to-fix-its-failing-infrastructure-221864