Oriwa Grove is a small family owned olive grove run by David and Rona Huggins. The grove is situated in the sunny district of Southern Wairarapa and has been in operation since the establishment of the grove in 2000. Oriwa Groves Extra Virgin Olive Oil; Wairarapa Gold best reflects the groves values, those being of high quality at affordable prices.

Starting with 20 acres of stony South Wairarapa land in 2000, shelter belts of Leyland Cypress were planted and in May of 2001 development began. The land was laid out into 38 rows of about 80 trees per row (about 3,000 trees in total). Each row was deep ripped to a depth of 1 metre, drip irrigation installed and the trees planted.

The trees have thrived although in the early years the strong wing of the South Wairarapa had a pronounced wind sculpting effect on the young growth and there remains a risk that adult trees may be blown over. On the positive side the wind enhances the health of the grove by keeping infections etc away.

A great deal of care is taken with grove husbandry and sustainability; all prunings are mulched back into the ground and we are as close to organic as is practicable at present. This care is now being reflected in our crop quantity and oil quality.

There is a romance about olives and olive growing that goes back a millennium. The olive fruit has been cultivated for thousands of years in the warm, dry conditions of the beautiful Mediterranean. The olive appears to thrive in these exotic conditions, which are similar to those preferred by wine grapes.

The pioneering work of people like Gidon Blumenfeld and Mike Ponder in Marlborough and the Lockies in the Wairarapa proved that olives grew well in New Zealand,  that the quality of NZ olive oil could be exceptionally high and that their are special unique flavors in our oils. 

This uniqueness flows from NZ characteristics of very widely varying day and night temperatures, modest but adequate rainfall and a clean environment.  It is also thought that the higher levels of ultra violet light in NZ contributes to the quality and flavour of our wine and olive oils.

Increasingly it has been proven that the stunning and unique characteristics NZ wine derives from our environment could be also emulated in NZ extra virgin olive oil. With this in mind we developed a passion to produce a classic NZ Extra Virgin Olive Oil of consistently superb quality and the öriwa Grove was born.