Dedication day at Makaweli Poi brought together Kaua'i's Westside poi producers and taro farmers. Pictured (l to r): John Aana, founder and former owner of Makaweli Poi and consultant for the new Hi'ipoi LLC, Julian Lacro, Willie Apo, Wesley Yadao - Photo: Liza Simon

Makaweli Poi forges
ahead with OHA help

By Liza Simon / Ka Wai Ola

For half a day you couldn't hear the chickens clucking as usual on this side street of rural Waimea town, as a small but gregarious group of people gathered to celebrate the dedication of the 15-year-old Makaweli Poi Mill, acquired in March by OHA's new Hi'ipoi LLC.

After a blessing given by Kahu Nani Hill, former OHA staffer-turned-Hi'ipoi LLC executive director Kanani Perry led the group, including OHA Trustees and staff, on a tour of the wooden mill building, which was once a grocery store and then a soda-bottling plant.

“Our goal is to keep feeding our loyal Kaua'i customers by supplying Makaweli Poi directly to 20 Kaua'i stores – our primary market. In the long run we want to do more to grow job skills in the community and support the local farmers who depend on this mill to buy their taro crop,” said Perry, standing beside the furnace-like stainless steel steamer, where several 80-pound bags of taro had just been loaded under the cover of burlap. Perry explained the hands-on steps that lead from the boiler to the hand-bagging of Makaweli Poi – the thick and slightly sour kind (especially if left out) preferable to many local palettes over its sweeter pasteurized counterpart.

Hi'ipoi executive director Kanani Perry says Makaweli Poi will continue to serve Kaua'i markets. - Photo: Liza Simon

As temperatures climbed inside the building, Perry said the secret to Makaweli's Poi Mill's storied success, including sizeable profit margins in the early 1990s, was to never miss the twice-weekly milling process – even though this depended at times on finding someone in the middle of the night to work wizardry with a broken boiler. For ingenuity in miraculous jerryrigging and more, she credited Makaweli Poi Factory's staff of 12 part-time workers, including several who, like former mill owner John A'ana, have full-time positions with the Kaua'i Fire Department at nearby Hanapepe station.

Last year, A'ana was looking to sell his Makaweli Poi Mill and retire from the business altogether, and he was approached OHA Trustee Donald Cataluna, who was responsible for initiating and arranging the OHA acquisition. While A'ana's poi reputation has grown to attract brisk business including caterer's orders – even from O'ahu, the orders have become harder to fill partly due to a taro shortage. Many westside Kaua'i taro farmers, whose lo'i have been in family hands for more than a century, have run into difficulties cultivating a crop even more labor intensive than poi milling in the way it requires fighting weeds and extracting the taro corms by hand.

Sitting outside under the lū'au tent with other celebrants to share a lunch of beef stew and poi plus a stunning view of the slopes of Waimea Canyon visible in the distance, A'ana said Kaua'i's Westside enjoys the right amount of sunshine, water and plenty of land. “But the issue for us is finding people who will farm taro for the love of it,” said A'ana, who's staying on as consultant to Hi'ipoi LLC and working with director Perry to build a west Kaua'i taro-farmers collective.

Perry has also just begun an afterschool program for five Waimea High School students at the Makaweli mill. “The mill is a good introduction to the rewards of farming, because you put in the hours and get the satisfaction of seeing your product go to market,” said Perry.

These developments go over well with lifelong Waimea taro farmers Linda and Franklin Dusenberry, who came to the Makaweli Poi dedication and to thank OHA for keeping mill operations going at a difficult time when transportation costs have pushed up the prices of important supplies such as fertilizer. “Taro farming brings people together – friends, family – even the radicals. We become one bigger and stronger family,” said Linda with a chuckle.

Perry couldn't agree more. Noting that Hi'ipoi LLC's philosophy is that taro farming and poi milling comprise a way of life and an integral part of Native Hawaiian culture, she said: “Coming out here to work means leaving behind your air-conditioned office, but I've never had a job like this where everyone has a special place and everyone is equally important.”