Taiao

Taiao mapping should begin with relationships, observations and responsibilities, not with a catalogue of environmental datasets. GIS can help iwi, hapū and whānau see patterns across whenua, wai and moana, but it is only one way of knowing what is happening.

For many kaupapa, the strongest picture comes from bringing public environmental data into conversation with mātauranga, kaitiaki observations, whānau experience, historical evidence and the practical knowledge of people who spend time on the whenua and wai.

The GIS should support that kōrero, not flatten it into one environmental layer.

Start with the kaupapa

Useful questions may include:

• What changes are people seeing in an awa, repo, takutai or ngahere?
• What places or relationships need protection or restoration?
• Where is mahinga kai under pressure?
• What is happening to access, water quality, habitat or taonga species?
• What has changed across generations, not just between two monitoring dates?
• What decisions do kaitiaki, whānau, hapū or iwi need to make?
• What public evidence could strengthen an existing local understanding?

The answer may require a map. It may also require kōrero, field visits, monitoring, photographs, historical records or other forms of evidence alongside the map.

Mātauranga is not another GIS layer

Do not treat mātauranga Māori as a dataset to integrate after the council and science layers are loaded.

Some knowledge is seasonal, relational, embodied in practice or meaningful only within particular whakapapa and tikanga. Turning it into a point or attribute may remove the very context that makes it useful.

Depending on the kaupapa, better approaches can include:

• keeping kōrero linked to a place without exposing the full narrative in the GIS
• storing a record that knowledge exists while keeping the knowledge itself elsewhere
• using broad areas or relationships rather than precise points
• retaining different observations over time instead of forcing one final value
• keeping sensitive mātauranga completely outside the digital system
• using GIS to point people back to an appropriate kaitiaki or source rather than trying to contain everything

Ask Should this be mapped? before designing the data model.

Public environmental data adds another lens

Councils, government agencies and research organisations hold valuable environmental datasets. These can help with catchment context, hazards, land cover, water quality, climate and biodiversity.

Common themes include:

Theme	Examples	Useful for
Wai	awa, roto, catchments, monitoring sites	catchment kōrero, restoration, trend analysis
Moana and takutai	coastline, estuaries, coastal hazards, marine habitat	resilience, customary use context, restoration
Whenua	land cover, soils, land-use capability	erosion, restoration and land-use planning
Hazards	flood, erosion, landslide	preparedness and long-term planning
Biodiversity	habitat and species observations	protection and monitoring, with sensitivity controls
Climate	rainfall, temperature, drought and projections	intergenerational planning and resilience

Use these datasets for the purpose for which they are suitable. A regional model may be excellent for screening and poor for deciding what is happening at a particular puna.

Let local observation challenge the dataset

If a council layer says a wetland is absent and kaitiaki know it is there, do not simply mark the local knowledge as unverified and move on.

Investigate the difference.

The dataset may be old, coarse or designed for another purpose. Local observation may also need further checking. The useful outcome is understanding why the sources differ, not automatically ranking one as official and the other as anecdotal.

Record:

• what each source says
• when it was observed or produced
• what scale or method it represents
• who has authority over any Māori-held information
• what remains uncertain

Scale and false precision

Taiao layers are produced at very different scales. Keep that visible.

Practical rules:

• do not use regional model layers as if they were site surveys
• treat modelled outputs as models, not measurements
• record scale, date and intended use
• distinguish measurement uncertainty from cultural or interpretive disagreement
• avoid decimals and sharp boundaries that imply more certainty than exists

A use_note field can be more useful than pretending every layer has one universal accuracy score.

A practical taiao record

For ordinary environmental observations, useful fields can include:

• feature or place name
• observation or feature type
• date
• source or recorder role
• method
• source reference
• confidence or use note
• review status
• sensitivity where relevant

For Māori-held knowledge, add only the metadata appropriate to the kaupapa. Who told us this? is not automatically a field that belongs in a broadly accessible layer.

A working process

1. Define the kaupapa

Be clear about the relationship, question or decision the mahi supports.

2. Identify what knowledge already exists

Consider local observations, previous hui or wānanga, iwi and hapū plans, monitoring programmes, archives and existing GIS.

3. Add public data that helps answer the question

Choose the smallest useful set rather than letting available layers define the project.

4. Go back to the whenua and wai

Use field visits and local review where appropriate. Maps should help people notice and discuss things, not substitute for being in the place.

5. Build different outputs for different needs

For example:

• kaitiaki may need detailed operational information
• governance may need trends, choices and priorities
• hui may need simple maps that support kōrero
• partners may need a purpose-limited extract
• the public may need only an approved summary

6. Keep the story of the data

Record dates, sources, methods, important decisions and restrictions so future users can understand what they are looking at.

Common public sources

Useful entry points include:

• data.govt.nz
• LINZ Data Service
• DOC open data
• Ministry for the Environment data services
• regional and local council environmental portals
• research datasets appropriate to the kaupapa

For local water, hazards and environmental monitoring, regional councils can be useful sources. Treat their datasets as public evidence, not as the final authority on what matters in a rohe.

Protecting places and knowledge

Taiao mapping can reveal:

• taonga species locations
• mahinga kai
• rongoā or gathering places
• sensitive cultural sites
• monitoring results whose publication could cause pressure or harm

Use different representations for different purposes. Keep the best authorised information controlled and create generalised derivatives where wider sharing is useful.

Do not assume that open environmental data remains harmless when combined with Māori-held knowledge. An overlay can create new sensitive information.

A final test

Look at the order of your project.

If it reads download environmental datasets → add mātauranga Māori → consult iwi, the frame is still backwards.

A stronger sequence is understand the kaupapa and relationships → identify what is already known → decide what belongs in GIS → use public and technical data to add evidence → return to the people and places that give the work meaning.

Build out the taiao workflow

Use the Taiao data domain to find environmental layers, Awa, wetlands, coast and moana for applied spatial questions, and Field GIS when kaitiaki or project teams need to add observations from the whenua.