Trouble is, damn thing is so big, and I'm so old school I need hard copy so I can scrawl and circle and throw around ?'s and !'s. We're gonna be a long time digesting this. At first cut it does seem so bloody conciliatory!
Hmmmm, some concerns starting to come through, mars 2 earth
And a pity that Murray Parsons passed away before its release. I've tried to find some web records of the first hui (held in 1988 at Rehua) but have only found an old, 1990, NZ Botanical Society newsletter that refers to it...
Murray Parsons. Botanist, Ngati Kahungunu (ki Wairarapa). Died 10 May 2011, aged just 69.
But the report itself starts with a remarkably positive statement from the Minister of Maori Affairs, expaling the reports name, Ko tenei Aotearoa' can mean "‘This is Aotearoa’ or ‘This is New Zealand’, or both. The ambiguity is intentional: a reminder, if one is needed, that Aotearoa and New Zealand must be able to co-exist in the same space."
Nice.
And then: "New Zealand sits poised at a crossroads both in race relations and on our long quest for a mature sense of national identity. These issues are not just important in themselves; they impact on wider questions of economic growth and social cohesion. We are propelled here by many factors: the enormous progress that has been made toward the settlement of historical Treaty claims and the resulting reincarnation of tribes as serious players in our economic, political, social, and cultural fabric; continuing growth in the Māori population and the seemingly intractable social and economic disparity between that community and the rest of New Zealand; the Māori cultural ‘renaissance’ and the rise of Māori creativity in the arts, music, and literature contrasted with ongoing cultural loss; and the extraordinary increase in wider cultural diversity in New Zealand through immigration over the last 30 years."
And then, stretching the standard metaphor for such things (kia ora Ropata Johnson: "A crossroads in history offers choices. The Wai 262 claimants really asked which of the many possible paths into the future New Zealand should now choose, and in this report we provide an answer based on the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi."
Just an overview then, clipped from the Waitangi website:
Chapter 1 looks at Māori arts and crafts, the works accumulated by our weavers, carvers, writers, musicians, artists, and others, framed by New Zealand’s intellectual property law, particularly copyright and trade marks.
Chapter 2 looks at the genetic and biological resources of 'flora and fauna' - the original moniker of this claim - which Māori have evolved intimate and long-standing relationships, and which are now of intense interest to scientists and researchers involved in bioprospecting, genetic modification, and intellectual property law, particularly patents and plant variety rights.
“Protecting taonga species and mātauranga Māori [Māori traditional knowledge] aids the survival of Māori culture itself. That is why…these things are important enough to justify protection in law.”
Ko Aotearoa Tēnei: Taumata Tuarua, Chapter 2
Chapter 3 RMA stuff.
Chapter 4 DoC stuff.
Chapter 5 focuses on te reo Māori
Chapter 6 considers Crown agencies regarding mātauranga Māori.
Chapter 7 examines rongoā Māori.
Chapter 8 addresses Crown’s policies on including Māori in the development of New Zealand’s position concerning international instruments such as the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
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