The Cromwell regional campus is grappling with sustainable practitioner questions in all three programme areas: Natural Resources, Adventure and Hospitality. 

Some aspects of sustainable practice are already built into many of these areas, but are not explicit in graduate profiles, so these are being redeveloped.

Also under development for delivery next year is the Certificate in Sustainable Practice with specialities in Local Government, Building, and Land Management. There is scope to add Tourism and other specialities in future.  Central Otago campus has also adopted NorthTec’s Certificate in Sustainable Land Management Level 3. 

Cromwell has developed multidisciplinary collaboration with students from horticulture and hospitality working together to develop a 'closed loop' system where food produced in horticulture classes is utilised by hospitality students, and waste products are composted to improve future production.

• The specific challenge is the wide range of programmes offered within these schools – from Adventure to Hospitality to Horticulture
• It is a further challenge to get traditional trade-based industries to look at sustainable practice
• Reviewing what is already built into programmes, and redeveloping graduate profiles. There is a certain amount of sustainability content in current programmes but it needs to be updated.
• People in industries such as viticulture and stonemasonry generally have some information about sustainable practice, but not the whole picture
• Looking at developing specific programmes such as the Certificate in Sustainable Land Management (approved). Looking at making the programme more generic and applying to other disciplines including business practice or tourism.
• Developing short courses for businesses to enable them to audit and improve their own sustainable practices
• CO campus has orchards, vineyards and kitchens. Through discussion with students as a group have identified a desire to ‘close the loop’. Cookery for example want to use harvested fruit for bottling, cooking, composting.
• Looking to reduce the waste that production students generate. Currently several tons of peaches and pears that may go to waste – looking at bringing to Dunedin for students.
• Need to speed up access to staff development in the area of sustainable practice.

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