Principles and responsibilities

Māori GIS is most useful when the technology starts with the kaupapa rather than becoming the kaupapa.

A GIS can help investigate whenua, follow an awa through a catchment, compare historical maps, organise field observations or communicate a planning question. It can also make uncertain or relational information look more fixed than the underlying evidence supports. These principles are about recognising that difference while keeping the work practical.

Begin with kaupapa

Before choosing a tool or building a layer, be clear about what the mahi is trying to support.

Useful questions include:

• what question, decision or kōrero the GIS needs to help with
• whose relationships with whenua, wai, place or information are involved
• what sources already exist
• what part of the problem is genuinely spatial
• what information needs to travel into GIS and what can remain in another form
• what a useful result should look like for the intended audience

A short project note can record these things. It does not create the relationships behind the work.

Relationships continue through the work

GIS involving iwi, hapū, marae and whānau sits inside existing relationships. Those relationships do not become a separate engagement stage simply because the project uses spatial technology.

In practice this can mean:

• understanding how the mahi arose
• keeping local names and source relationships visible
• showing drafts while representations can still change
• distinguishing one source or account from another
• recording why a geometry or classification was chosen
• keeping enough context for the next kaimahi to understand the work

The technical workflow should help those relationships remain legible rather than flattening them into a generic project structure.

Technical access is only technical access

GIS platforms need accounts, roles, groups and sharing settings. Those controls determine who can open, edit or administer a system. They do not define whakapapa, tikanga, local knowledge or the meaning of the information held inside it.

Keep those different questions separate. A person may administer ArcGIS Online without being the source of an ingoa wāhi. A council may maintain a statutory layer without defining the full meaning of the whenua it intersects.

See Who decides what? and Access and security.

Sensitivity depends on context

Spatial information can reveal more or less depending on its purpose, audience, precision and what other layers it is combined with.

Examples include:

• wāhi, urupā or cultural landscapes
• mahinga kai or taonga species
• whānau-level information
• access routes or infrastructure
• overlapping or contested accounts
• information collected for one piece of mahi and later reused for another

Different versions of a map can therefore carry different geometry or attributes. Sometimes the most useful GIS record is only a reference to fuller kōrero held elsewhere.

See Sensitive places and Publishing maps with sensitive locations.

Representation should match the evidence

A point, line or polygon is a representation. It is not automatically the thing itself.

Depending on the source, useful representations can include:

• exact surveyed geometry
• approximate locations
• broad areas
• several source-specific versions
• routes or networks
• narrative-linked points
• time-enabled records
• no mapped geometry where a map adds little value

A sharp line should not make a weak source look certain. A broad polygon should not imply that everything inside it has the same relationship.

See Things GIS cannot represent well and Mana whenua and rohe without hard boundaries.

Keep whakapapa and provenance visible

Spatial data becomes much easier to misuse or misunderstand when it is separated from where it came from.

Depending on the kaupapa, useful provenance can include:

• institutional source and date
• source document, map or record reference
• Māori-held source or relationship where that context matters
• why the information was recorded
• whether the geometry is exact, indicative or generalised
• uncertainty or differing accounts
• what transformation or analysis produced a derived layer
• which version was prepared for which audience

This does not require publishing every detail. The working record simply needs enough context to remain understandable.

See Provenance and source checking and Metadata and documentation.

Boundaries answer particular questions

A line can represent a legal parcel, statistical area, planning zone, Treaty settlement area, project extent or a local working representation.

Those geometries can overlap without contradicting one another because they were created for different purposes.

For rohe and mana whenua work, GIS can also represent:

• overlapping areas
• shared areas
• corridors
• named landscapes
• seasonal relationships
• several source accounts
• indicative rather than exclusive extents

See Authoritative for what? and Māori land blocks versus parcels.

Public datasets are evidence with a purpose

LINZ, councils, Stats NZ, environmental agencies and other publishers provide essential spatial information. Each source was created to support particular functions.

A cadastral parcel is highly useful for a cadastral question. A deprivation index supports particular statistical analysis. A council hazard model represents the model and assumptions used by that council.

The useful GIS habit is to ask what a source can tell you, what it cannot, how current it is and what other evidence helps answer the kaupapa.

Start with GIS data for Aotearoa and the spatial data catalogue.

Language shapes the map

Labels and field names are part of the representation.

Terms such as boundary, owner, site, confirmed, deprived, authoritative or stakeholder can be precise in one context and misleading in another.

Use the term that best describes the source and relationship. Keep ingoa wāhi, macrons, historical names and source spellings visible where they matter.

See Place names and ingoa wāhi and Cartography and map communication.

Review meaning as well as geometry

A technically correct map can still answer the wrong question.

A useful review may therefore check:

• source and date
• geometry and CRS
• names and labels
• what the map appears to claim
• whether uncertainty is visible
• whether a derived layer is clearly identified
• whether the output suits its audience
• whether another version would better serve a different audience

Where sources or accounts differ, preserving that difference can be more informative than forcing one merged answer.

Technology follows the work

QGIS, ArcGIS, Google Earth, KoboToolbox, web GIS and paper maps solve different problems.

A small hapū research project may be well served by QGIS and a GeoPackage. A distributed taiao team may need mobile forms and synchronisation. An iwi organisation may use several environments at once. A hui may need a clear A3 map rather than another web application.

Choose the simplest combination that supports the mahi and can be carried forward.

See Choose your tools, Field GIS and Starting an iwi or hapū GIS.

Sharing creates another version of the information

A shared map, partner extract, StoryMap or public web layer is another data product. It can be prepared for that audience without making the working database itself the publication product.

Before creating that version, it is useful to know:

• what question the audience needs answered
• what source and date should be visible
• what level of geometry is useful
• which fields add meaning
• what limitations need explaining
• whether the output should remain editable or simply viewable

See Publishing Māori GIS maps, Map sharing and data access and Attribution and sources.

Continue from here

Use Kaupapa Māori GIS for the wider worldview, Māori Data Sovereignty for practical data-system choices, and Governance and practice for continuity, metadata and working arrangements.

Last reviewed: 26 August 2026