Christchurch, NZ — The New Zealand Textile Fishing competition which is now held every two years, took place in February on an island inside the beautiful Auckland Harbour. This Island was hired for the exclusive use of all the distributors, interior designers, suppliers  and  retailers to the New Zealand Textile industry. This year we had Australian, Belgium and Dutch suppliers in attendance on the beach giving support. The event brings all Customers and competitors  together and is a serious meet and greet event for everyone involved. This year’s event was not as large as previous events as many boats were not able to compete due to the horrific  weather and could not venture out in the smaller boats. At this exact moment New Zealand was hit by the tail end of  tropical cyclone Winston, which devastated Fiji.  However, there was a break in the weather and still 200 competitors plus an extra 50 support people arrived on the island. The sun shone, but the wind blew. The overall winning  Team James McCourtie Textiles headed up by Hamish and Jordan took most of the prizes on offer in all divisions; team Luxaflex and Charles Parsons coming in second and third respectively. This event also is used as a foundation event  to raise money for the Sweet Louise foundation which looks after women and their families of women with terminal breast cancer.  This year we raised $16,000 which will definitely help out many families facing this terrible disease. -- Brett Fleetwood, Scorpio Agencies