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Last reviewed: 16 August 2026

Mahinga kai mapping

Mahinga kai is not simply a polygon showing where food can be collected.

A mahinga may involve species, habitat, season, access, tikanga, environmental condition, knowledge, practice and relationships among several places. Some locations are still actively used. Others are remembered historically, being restored or no longer accessible.

A useful GIS needs to preserve that movement and context rather than freeze the relationship into one permanent site layer.

Begin with the kaupapa​

Different mapping questions need different information.

Examples include:

  • Where are restoration priorities?
  • How has access changed?
  • Which waterways or habitats support particular resources?
  • Where are environmental pressures affecting customary use?
  • What historical evidence exists for former mahinga?
  • What information is needed for a consent or planning process?
  • Which places should remain known only to a restricted group?

Do not collect detailed harvest information simply because the project may want it later.

Map relationships, not just harvest points​

A useful mahinga kai model may link:

  • place or area
  • species or resource type
  • habitat
  • season or period
  • access
  • environmental condition
  • historical or current status
  • source or knowledge relationship
  • sensitivity
  • intended use

The exact field structure should follow local kaupapa and tikanga.

A generic schema is a technical convenience, not a definition of mahinga kai.

Time matters​

A place may be important only at particular times.

Instead of one static polygon, consider records such as:

place_ref
resource_type
period_or_season
observation_date
status
condition
access_note
source_ref
sensitivity

This allows the same place to carry different observations through time without one row becoming the permanent truth.

Where maramataka context is part of the kaupapa, record it in the form and level approved locally rather than inventing a universal national field list.

Historical, current and future states​

Keep these distinct.

Useful statuses may include:

  • historically recorded
  • remembered or described
  • currently used
  • currently inaccessible
  • degraded
  • under restoration
  • potential future use

A historic mahinga should not appear on a current operational harvesting map unless the purpose is clear.

Likewise, not currently used does not mean the relationship has disappeared.

Access is part of the geography​

Mahinga kai can be affected by:

  • private land access
  • road or track changes
  • landlocking
  • flood or erosion
  • water levels
  • coastal access
  • regulatory settings
  • pollution
  • infrastructure

Map access conditions separately from the mahinga itself where useful.

This makes it easier to see whether the problem is the health of the resource, the ability to reach it, or both.

Awa and catchments​

For freshwater mahinga, the point where a resource is gathered may be only one part of the relevant geography.

Upstream activities can affect downstream places through:

  • sediment
  • nutrients
  • discharges
  • barriers to fish passage
  • water takes
  • temperature
  • habitat modification

Use the catchment and river network to understand these relationships.

See Awa as the organising geography.

Moana and coastal mahinga​

Coastal and marine relationships may involve:

  • reefs and rocky shore
  • estuaries
  • shellfish beds
  • fisheries areas
  • access points
  • spawning or nursery habitat
  • customary management areas

MPI publishes information about Māori customary fishing arrangements, including mātaitai reserves and taiāpure. Those statutory areas are useful context but should not be treated as a complete map of mahinga kai relationships.

Public environmental data is supporting evidence​

Useful external sources may include:

  • water-quality monitoring
  • river networks
  • wetlands
  • land cover
  • coastal habitat information
  • pollution or consent data
  • customary fisheries management areas
  • historical imagery

Do not create a mahinga kai suitability score from public environmental datasets and then present it as Māori knowledge.

The model can identify environmental conditions or possible pressures. Local knowledge and authority determine what that means for the kaupapa.

Sensitive information​

Detailed mahinga kai locations may be sensitive because publication could:

  • increase harvesting pressure
  • expose taonga species
  • enable unwanted access
  • reveal cultural information
  • make a vulnerable place easier to find

A public map can often communicate the issue through:

  • catchments
  • broader coastal areas
  • trends
  • habitat condition
  • aggregated counts
  • generalised locations

Keep precise operational or knowledge-holder information in a restricted layer where appropriate.

Observation records​

For monitoring, preserve who or what produced the observation.

Possible source types include:

  • field monitoring
  • whānau or kaitiaki observation
  • historical document
  • environmental dataset
  • research publication
  • imagery interpretation

These are not interchangeable. Keep the source type and date visible.

Do not reduce success to extraction​

A mahinga kai GIS should not measure only how much is harvested.

Depending on the kaupapa, outcomes may include:

  • restored access
  • improved habitat
  • return of species
  • safer gathering
  • ability to practise tikanga
  • intergenerational knowledge transfer
  • whānau participation
  • environmental recovery

Some of those outcomes may be partly spatial. Others belong in kōrero, monitoring programmes or other records.

A practical workflow​

  1. Define the decision or restoration kaupapa.
  2. Agree what information needs to be spatial and who has authority over it.
  3. Map environmental and access context first.
  4. Add local observations at the minimum useful precision.
  5. Include time or status where relationships change.
  6. Separate historical, current and future representations.
  7. Review sensitive locations before sharing.
  8. Use public derivatives for external communication.
  9. Keep provenance with each observation or interpretation.
  10. Review whether the GIS is strengthening the mahinga or merely documenting its decline.

Sources​

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