Maori Economy: Whakairo te whenua, whakairo te tangata

Maori Party may quit government

2012-01-31T14:07:00.000+13:00

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water...

The Minister for State Owned Enterprises, Tony Ryall, says provisions protecting land under Treaty claims would still apply. However, Section 9 is under review...

What's Section 9 I hear you ask?

9. Treaty of Waitangi

Nothing in this Act shall permit the Crown to act in a manner that is inconsistent with the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.

Oh dear. They wouldn't ignore Maori concerns again.

Would they?

Maori economy via Google alert

2012-01-30T17:10:00.003+13:00

Two weeks ago I availed myself of weekly auto-updates through Google's news trawling abilities, using the key terms 'Maori economy' and 'Indigenous economies'. Thus far I've had just one update on the Maori economy, and that an old item on BNZ's appointment of a Maori business manager (that I posted on awhile ago). This is despite several Maori trusts being involved in Michael Fay's abortive attempt to purchase the Crafar farms and other activities around Maori cultural political economies.

Somethings wrong, or something may be right.

First, mainstream media undoubtedly doesn't have great interest or wherewithal to follow and report what is going on under any general labeling of 'Maori economic activities' (a wide sphere through any intelligent approach).

But second, few Maori ventures make a big song and dance about their work. On the contrary, the more successful, the less they seem to say! Of course, the less they have to say...

Here's the latest Google alert:

Symposium to focus on leadership within Maori Business
TangataWhenua.com: Maori News & Views
The simultaneous growth in the size of the Maori economy combined with the ongoing need to address social issues puts pressure on existing leadership and ...

Key's speech upsets Maori affairs minister
MSN NZ News
Mr Key's speech ranged from the economy to welfare, health and education and Dr Sharples, who holds ministerial portfolios including Maori affairs, ...

Sharples disappointed at 'obvious omissions' from PM's speech
Voxy
Maori Party Co-leader Dr Pita Sharples is disappointed at the obvious omissions ... exclusively about the economy and budgetary matters," said Dr Sharples.

Exclusion irritates Chamber of Commerce
Otago Daily Times
"We want to understand Maori views before we take final decisions. ... David Parker said the Government's low expectations for the New Zealand economy, ...

Maori name changes on the cards in settlement
TVNZ
An eventual collective settlement will include Maori guardianship of Ninety Mile Beach, ... "It will be a shot in the arm for the economy.

Perhaps we're still gearing up for 2012.

Tucson Book Bans?!

2012-01-20T16:40:00.002+13:00

Tucson is special to my heart, having been the first US destination I visited (attending Prof. Charles Ragin's excellent graduate course on QCA). So I follow it in the news, and unfortuantely, not enough dull moments in what people think of as a sleep ol' town...

And what to make of recent wire buzz, are they really banning books in this day and age?! Seems Mexican-American Studies teachers were sent a memo from the school district saying that the following books, which are specifically mentioned in a court order, are to be removed from the classroom, boxed up, and stored in the district's textbook depository, presumably until furnace-time can be booked:

Critical Race Theory by Richard Delgado

500 Years of Chicano History in Pictures edited by Elizabeth Martinez

Message to Aztlan by Rodolfo Corky Gonzales

Chicano! The History of the Mexican Civil Rights Movement by Arturo Rosales

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Fiere

Rethinking Columbus: The Next 500 Years edited by Bill Bigelow and Bob Peterson

Occupied America: A History of Chicanos by Rodolfo Acuña

Seems work by Winona LaDuke's "To the Women of the World: Our Future, Our Responsibility" is also on the banned list, high praise we might say...

Downtown Tucson carpark...maybe they could light the bonfire here?
Salon piece...

Science of Cities: the future for urban Indigenous communities...

2012-01-20T08:00:00.000+13:00

Will Allen (who has an excellent website, 'Learning for Sustainability') flicks on dozens of great snippets including this on a blog by Michale Batty on 'The Science of Cities'. Love the graphics...

I always do a quick search for 'indigenous' on new sites and, shame but no surprises ...

This lack does open up considerable challenges and opportunities for Indigenous research in the area of urbanising indigenous communities. 84% of Maori now live in urban areas - it was only 26% at the end of WW2...

Source: Te Ara

How are we to live? An age old question perhaps, but in Christchurch we are faced with framing a future urban existence not from a blank slate exactly, more like a rubble-state. I'm now a convert to Michael Gunder's thesis in seeing the whole concept and practice of 'planning' as an empty signifier. Let's admit that for all the planners we've produced, fat lot of good it did for the citizens of Otautahi/Christchurch.

I'm only up to chapter four of his and Hillier's 'Planning in Ten Words or Less' but it gives some meaty material for my courses this year as I work in the implications for Maori planning and development.

There is some good stuff coming out of my old workplace, Manaaki Whenua, and Kepa Morgan has published on the Mauri model...

Source: A Tangata Whenua Perspective on Sustainability using the Mauri Model

Readings:
Urban Maori as ‘New Citizens’: The Quest for Recognition and Resources by Paul Meredith

The role of Māori values in Low-impact Urban Design and Development (LIUDD) by Garth Harmsworth

First Nations stereotypes and why people need to stop using them, from Wab Kinew

2012-01-12T12:40:00.000+13:00

Maori Economy, news update

2012-01-07T11:23:00.000+13:00

The Labour Party announced its new line up at the end of last year, with Shane Jones at No. 7 and taking on the newly established shadow cabinet position of Maori Economic Development. (NB: always funny to see non-Maori, non-Pasifika, non-Asian NZ MPs as 'European', a la Kiwiblog).

Sealord, the joint venture between Aotearoa Fisheries and Japanese company Nissui, netted $20m profit on revenue of $573m during 15 months trading to September. Although slightly up on the previous result, an unchanged dividend of $16m is to be paid out.

Mutton birds will be tested for radioactivity following leaks from the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan, having fed and shed in the region in April of last year.

This site records the history of the so-called Maori economy that includes an outline of those reports that have contributed to the current model of understanding and interpreting this economy, and therefore the model by which other cultures and their economies (notably, of course, the Treaty partner), including banks, universities, agribusiness, exporters, and importers. We now see a number of strategic decisions by these potential and existing stakeholders. BNZ have appointed a head of Maori business, Pierre Tohe (of Waikato descent), in acknowledgement of this growing sector.

Other banks are also attentive: ANZ appointed David Harrison as head of Maori relationships in March, 2011; Westpac is also expanding its national Maori strategy.

International Indigenous economies snippets...

Jennifer Campeau elected to Saskatchewan Legislature
Sask Party First Nations candidate, Jennifer Campeau, has been elected in Saskatoon Fairview to the Saskatchewan Legislature.

Jennifer has been a regular attendee of the annual Native American and Indigenous Studies Association conference and organised a panel on Indigenous economic development at last years meeting in Sacramento.

Zimbabwe
Zimbabwean Indigenisation and Empowerment minister Saviour Kasukuwere argues 2012 should see people pursue economic empowerment with the understanding it was only when the majority indigenous Zimbabweans own and participate in their national economy that it would grow in a sustainable manner.

He said such growth, pursued within the socio-economic harmony achieved when the majority was guaranteed an equitable share in their national economy, would become more appealing to foreign investors whose investments are best secured by locals with whom they will partner.

Aotearoa/New Zealand and income disparity

2012-01-06T21:17:00.000+13:00

Christchurch is atwirl at council CEO Tony Marryattt’s recent pay rise of 14.4% adding $68,129 to his salary of $470,400 to $538,529 a year, backdated from July 1 last year. Marryatt's annual salary package has increased 45 per cent during his four years at the council, beginning at $370,825. Nice work if you can get it...

Some would argue this outpouring of rage is nothing more than envy, but surely we can accept some people deserve more pay than others but retain our right to be outraged at how much moolah some managers manage to make, particularly in times of economic downturn?! Another rebuttal is that running such a beast as a modern council or corporation is much harder now than it was, say, in the 1970s. But cast your mind back to old school offices, pre-xerox, pre-PC, bottles of twink for endless typos, a secretarial pool...

Imagine trying to run a post-disaster city with that sort of technology.

I believe the growing income disparity in Aotearoa is corrosive. It rots whatever collective membership we may pretend to still have in the economy. Insisting that there is an international market force compelling CEO's to accept ever-increasing amounts to manage or mismanage their fiefdom (which is actually, in the case of Marryatt, our city) is a nonsense. The data shows a lot of variation, not least because of the range of methodologies employed. Wikipedia does pronounce that in 2005 the U.S. had the highest ratio of 39:1 CEO's compensation to pay of manufacturing production workers. Britain was second with 31.8:1; Italy third with 25.9:1, oh and look, Aotearoa/NZ fourth with 24.9:1.

That Marryatt was holidaying in Australia during the latest series of significant earthquakes epitomises a vacumn of leadership in this instance. But in many ways it hides a multitude of inequities. Consider John Key, a millionaire prior to politics (he was a money trader, not exactly the 'businessman' some have made out)...

Source: The Economist

Daron Acemoglu notes that economists rarely focus on CEOs because i), there aren't that many CEOs or multimillionaires meaning that when you take, say, a 1% sample of NZ households you’re not going to get many, and ii), data are 'top coded' meaning you don’t actually see people’s exact earnings.Therefore a lot of the economics literature has looked at things like, do people with university degrees earn more than high school graduates, or do postgraduates earn more?
Brian Easton has compared NZ ineqaulity (using the 'Gini co-efficient')...

Income equality in the OECD countries (Source: Brian Easton. 'Income and wealth distribution - Factor income', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, updated 26-Nov-1)

So as a country, we less equal than most other coutnries we like to compare ourselves to (especially Scandinavia and Australia).

Data on Maori income distribution is, again, quite limited. Te Ara offers the following graph, skewed, I assume, by NZ men earning considerably more than NZ women (again, corporate positions are predominantly held be men) as tane do earn more than wahine:

Dixon and Mare (2004) have published a detailed (and highly technical) paper on 'Understanding Changes in Māori Incomes and Income Inequality 1997-2003'.

Interesting paper by Sin and Mare (2004) on 'Māori Incomes:Investigating Differences Between Iwi' who find that policies aimed at improving Māori incomes may be more cost-effective if they target specific iwi. Biggest causal factor, and no surprises here, is qualifications.

Median real incomes summary (2001 $s)

Median real incomes of large iwi (2001 $s)

Despite ongoing promotion of a Maori economy discourse, and significant discussions regarding the post-settlement environment, improving Maori incomes must surely lie with the wider NZ economy, placing great emphasis on education and training strategies in a domestic climate of volatile economic contexts and a global context of economic contraction. We've not managed it well this far...

Press articles...
Editorial: Marryatt must front

NZ Statistics
The future for New Zealanders: Maori

Readings

'Tax and equity' by Brian Easton, one of several (linked) analyses of the New Zealand context.

'The growth of executive pay' by (and I love these monikers!) Lucian Bebchuk and Yanev Grinstein (2005).
'Anatomy of the 1%' by David Moberg