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A lead researcher of a project looking at Maori knowledge and attitudes around water says it is being driven by timely and practical considerations.
The four-year project, Nga Tohu o te Taiao – Sustaining and Enhancing Wai Maori and Mahinga Kai, is being funded by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.
Maui Hudson, the deputy director of Waikato University’s Te Kotahi Research Institute, says it comes out of the ministry’s new sandpit process, where the government and stakeholder groups including iwi identify what research is needed and who might collaborate to do it.
He says the freshwater iwi leaders group has already identified key Maori understanding of water, and the project will involve university and Crown research institutes and others.
"We’re really going to have to work alongside the councils and also the iwi entities as part of this project. We’re working with the Waikato Tainui College of Research and Development. It’s important we involve iwi researchers. They work very closely with their communities, but also because this is an ongoing conversation between the various communities and the councils along the river
," he says.
Maui Hudson says having iwi involved in a co-governance arrangement for the Waikato River is important for the project.
Copyright © 2013, UMA Broadcasting Ltd
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