Founded In 2007 with 20 buckets of compost worms, the world's largest worm farming operation in Taupō has now turned those 20 buckets into three billion.
MyNoke uses worms to convert thousands of tonnes of organic waste into rich vermicast each year, which is then sold to agriculturists and gardeners to improve soil productivity.
Originally from Germany, founder Dr Michael Quintern brought his expertise to New Zealand and began MyNoke to provide a solution for bulk organic waste management; he believed that organic waste was being ‘wasted’, when it could instead be used as a valuable input in Vermicomposting.
“With my background in organic waste management on farmland and integrating this from a soil science perspective, I needed to come up with a technology on how to give back to the soil”, says Michael.
Regenerative resource management (vermicomposting) - means valuable nutrients are diverted from landfill. Instead of going to waste, these nutrients are returned to the soil, where they came from.
“The challenge was taking it from a small worm farm into an industry scale worm farm for 250 thousand tons of organic waste out of landfills from pulp and paper industries”.
Although the company headquarters are based in Taupō, MyNoke spread the love by operating worm farms both inside and outside the Waikato region with plans to expand to more sites throughout New Zealand in the coming years.
The Waikato region was chosen for the first two worm farms due to the ideal central location in the North Island. At its heart, MyNoke is all about sustainability, therefore the location provides low transport costs and carbon footprint when transporting waste resources from key suppliers in the region.
MyNoke, meaning ‘my earthworms’ in Te Reo, has a strong connection to the earth as Michael advocates the importance of working with nature to make it all happen.
“I am an expert in communicating with the worms, and make sure they are supported in what nature designed them to do".
"If compost is black gold, then worm castings are black raw diamonds.”
To date, MyNoke has diverted over one million tonnes of organic waste from landfill.
If you want to find out more about MyNoke head to their website here.