>> good evening and welcome to MetroFocus.

I am Jenna Flanagan.

Long Island it ranks among the most vulnerable metro areas in the country when it comes to the rest -- risk of climate change.

Decades of pollution from septic systems and fertilizer runoff have made the situation worse and the Indian nation is leading the fight to keep communities above water.

That help farmers, a multigenerational nonprofit is expounding their kelp hatchery and farm in Southhampton to counter climate change.

The group recently teamed up with the nature Conservancy on their expansion.

Taylor is the director of the kelp farmers and Tiffany water is global aquaculture monitor.

If they join us tonight as part of our heirloom promise an initiative on the human stories of climate change and solutions.

For people who might not be clear or understand, what does kelp have to do with climate change and more importantly sewage runoff that could be I guess exacerbating the problem, how does kelp help fix the problem?

>> kelp is a type of seaweed.

It is a natural resource for my tribal nation.

It grows in abundance around our territory and has been relied on for a number of different purposes relevant to the climate crisis we are in, sugar kelp particularly has an incredible ability to sequester carbon and also extract excess nitrates from the water, which are causing varying levels of oxygen and marine fishery die offs that we are trying to prevent and kind of go against some of the over development and lack of appropriate septic systems.

It is an ancient plant that has been in relation with our tribe for many, many years.

It continues to have moderate impact on our ecological well-being here.

>> Tiffany, so how do you farm kelp?

And I guess how do you even expend a farm?

When most people think about farming, they think above ground.

How does this work?

Underwater?

>> no, that's a great question.

A lot of people do not realize actually how many greenhouse gases are admitted through food production.

It is 25% of admissions, 75 percent of habitat degradation, 80% of water use.

What makes seaweed farming special is it does not have those effects.

Seaweed farming is something that is low greenhouse gas emissions, admitting requires no feed, no fertilizer to grow.

It is growing off of the nutrients in the water column.

So in addition to it not requiring excess nutrients beyond what is existing, it is cleaning up the water that it is feeding from.

It is this incredibly important production system that we have.

Generally farming is done through long lines but it can also be depending on where you are in the world also along the bottom.

So lots of different ways to actually form seaweed globally.

It is a massive industry in Asia and a newer industry for North America and Europe.

>> that's very interesting because it sounds like a I guess Greenway to deal with some of our waste problems.

Is this the only part of the country where kelp farming is being used to help clean the water?

>> not at all.

In fact, I would say even though 99% of seaweed farming that is occurring right now commercially is in Asia, there is a growing wave within North America of folks that are interested in using seaweed farming.

The Shinnecock kelp farmers are pursuing this for ecosystem services that seaweed farming can provide.

In addition to the food.

And the jobs and the products it can provide.

Some of the areas where it seaweed farming is popular in the U.S. is Maine and Alaska.

90% of the seaweed farmed in the U.S. is coming from those states.

There's a lot of interest in other areas including the West Coast where we work with tribes and first Nations were interested in seaweed farming.

>> going back to the first Nations of course, I am wondering if you can tell us about the history that your people have with not just farming kelp, but using it.

What is it that I guess perhaps people coming here did not realize about the importance of kelp?

>> went up my nation -- my nation is a first contact nation, when we encountered the first European colonists, they were cold and they were hungry.

And we helped them and we helped them by showing them how to use seaweed to insulate their homes.

And how to use seaweed to fertilize crops together with a mixture of fish.

And so traditionally we used this mixture as a bio stimulant for corn, beans and squash, which is known as the three sisters.

But when you add kelp as a soil abetment to flowers, vegetables, gardens, farms, it has this incredible bio stimulant property that increases production of this nation for again thousands of years before Europeans came.

Beyond the practical uses, there is cosmetic uses.

There is so many uses.

They are looking at textiles.

For my nation we were able to use our seaweed history to obtain a political recognition known as federal acknowledgment by showing our reserve treaty rights to seaweed as an abundant natural resource.

It has allowed us to grow our industry in states like Maine, Connecticut, Alaska in terms of regulating seaweed.

>> I want to go deeper because I'm sure a lot people would've picked up on the fact that I said your form is in Southhampton.

That is a location that I would say everybody knows about.

What has been your journey in getting sovereignty over such popular waters?

>> it is a continuing struggle for sure.

The Shinnecock nation's ancestral territory has been reduced to about 1000 acres.

Our main residential territory, the Shinnecock is a peninsula.

We are surrounded on all sides by water.

We are experiencing sealevel rise, saltwater intrusion, erosion.

We get hit by hurricanes, Superstorm's, and the interesting thing is about our territory, 70% of our population lives, 100 50% under the federal poverty level.

When you go out to the edge of our territory and he looked out across the water, you are looking out at $175 million homes on this area island called Meadow Lane.

It's known as billionaires Lane and it is the homes of the wealthiest people on the planet.

Before COVID-19, they would only live there in the summer but all of that -- these are mansions.

They had 26 bathrooms.

They would dump waste directly into our water, the Shinnecock Bay, which is the Bay that our people have used as a food source to survive on since the last Ice Age almost.

We have almost 13,000 years of recorded history of finding our food source from the bay.

And as a result of overdevelopment, overpopulation after COVID we saw an exodus of people from Manhattan.

In the area Shinnecock Hills which is the watershed for our Bay increased in population by 40%, higher than anywhere else in the region.

Our waters just got declared a federal fisheries disaster zone because our shellfish, sea scallops perish at a rate of 99.9 percent.

These are our food sources.

Our people have survived off shellfish for thousands of years and now we are experiencing these mass Marina die offs because all of this literal waste from some of the richest people in the country is devastating our Bay and ecology.

So our attempt to align our traditional cultural practices and knowledge of kelp and seaweed as being this critically important natural resource for us, it is something that we are doing to save our territory and our homelands.

But it is not something that we are keeping to ourselves, we are sharing our knowledge.

With everybody.

Because we do want to lead the way and be a model for implementing climate strategies and it is not for a lack of resources.

It is for a lack of will.

We are providing it that will and how to enact the change that you need to see.

For me, I have a one-year-old son and I want him to be able to fish and clam on Shinnecock Bay like his ancestors have for generation after generation.

So it is very important to us to protect the land and the water and maintain our ways of life.

Bite again it using our traditional knowledge combined with modern science to find solutions to the climate struggles that we are facing due to the excess greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and reliance on fossil fuel industry.

>> what would you say are your long-term goals for this, your long-term hope?

And Tiffany, I will throw this to you because we've got a minute left.

>> absolutely.

We are feeling fortunate to be partnering with the kelp farmers.

When opportunities arise and we are invited to collaborate TMC works in collaboration with local community partners to support their visions, learn from their stewardship experiences and amplify leadership.

Not only does that align with our values, it shows that indigenous communities achieve greater conservation results and sustained biodiversity Dan government protected areas.

We are excited to continue to work with Shinnecock kelp farmers and other communities as they grow their seaweed farm.

Excited to help support them.

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