Glossary

Te Reo Māori

Hapū: A Māori clan, sub-tribe, or primary political and social unit in Māori society, consisting of multiple extended family groups.
Iwi: The largest social and political grouping in New Zealand Māori society, commonly translated as a tribe, nation, or people.
Kaiwhakahaere Kaupapa: A project manager or programme, policy administrator.
Mataawaka: Māori living in a region, most commonly Auckland, who are not affiliated with the local mana whenua.
Mana whenua: The Māori iwi or hapū that holds customary authority, territorial rights, and spiritual jurisdiction over a specific area of land and its natural resources.
Papakainga: A papakainga is a planned communal housing development built on Māori land, allowing intergenerational living for hapū to live together according to traditional values.
Ropu: A group, party, company, association, committee, organisation, or category.
Tangata Whenua: People of the land, referring to the indigenous people of Aotearoa.
Te Puni Kōkiri: The New Zealand government's principal policy of Māori wellbeing and development.
Tikanga: The Māori custom, traditional value, and behavioural guideline that dictates the right, proper, or appropriate way of doing things.
Whanau: Family or extended family.
Whakapapa: A term for genealogy, lineage, and descent.
Whenua: Refers to the physical earth, region or land where people feel they belong.
Whare: A house or building.

Technical terms

Ancillary activities: An activity that supports and is subsidiary to a primary activity.
Aorangi Māori Trust Board: The Board manages assets to promote the health, social and economic welfare, education, and vocational training of its beneficiaries. The beneficiaries are individuals and their descendants determined by a Māori Land Court order.
Architect: A licensed professional who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings and physical structures.
Access: A continuous route that permits people and goods to move safely into, within, and out of buildings, or between spaces within a building.
Building coverage: The proportion or percentage of a site's net site area that is occupied by the horizontal footprint of buildings or roofed structures.
Building consent: A written approval from a registered Building Consent Authority, such as a local city or district council, that lets you carry out specific building work on a property.
Building designer: A trade professional who creates functional, code-compliant, and aesthetic plans for residential and commercial structures.
Building height: The vertical distance between the floor level of the lowest occupied space above the ground and the top of the highest occupied floor or structure.
Civil or Geotechnical engineers: A specialised engineer who analyses the mechanical and physical properties of soil, rock, and groundwater to ensure artificial structures rest on safe, stable, and feasible foundations.
Code Compliance Certificate: Section 95 of the Building Act 2004 requires a Building Consent Authority (such as a local council). It confirms that completed building work complies with the approved building consent and meets the standards of the New Zealand Building Code.
Contractor: An individual or business entity hired to perform building or engineering works under a contract for services rather than an employment agreement.
Discretionary activity: A land use or development activity under New Zealand's Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) that requires a resource consent before it can take place, and which the local council has full discretion to either grant or decline.
Earthworks: Any activity that alters, disturbs, moves, removes, places, cuts, fills, or excavates soil, clay, sand, rock, or land surfaces.
Electricity networks: The integrated system of transmission lines, distribution cables, substations, transformers, and works is used to convey and supply electricity from generation sources to consumer points.
Flood-control infrastructure: Engineered physical works, natural-mimicking systems, and asset networks designed to manage river flows, reduce flood risks, and protect communities, farmlands, and critical assets from heavy rainfall, high tides, and river surges.
Grants: A financial contribution or sum of money awarded by a government agency, local council, or charitable trust to support building, infrastructure, or property development projects, which generally does not have to be repaid.
HDC: Hastings District Council.
Housing New Zealand: Now known as Kāinga Ora – Homes and Communities, it is the New Zealand Crown entity responsible for providing public and social housing.
Infrastructure: The fixed, long-lived physical structures and networks that provide essential services to support the economy, environment, and community.
Land law specialist: A qualified solicitor or barrister who focuses on the legal rules, transactions, and disputes concerning real estate, titles, and interests in land.
Land-law adviser: A qualified legal professional who provides expert guidance, transaction handling, and representation regarding real estate, land rights, titles, and property legislation.
Land readiness: A piece of land has cleared all legal, technical, and physical hurdles so that a home can proceed straight to Building Consent and construction without subdivision or site delays.
Loan: An arrangement where a lender, such as a bank, credit union, or finance company, gives money to a borrower, who agrees to pay it back over time, usually with added interest and fees.
Māori cultural activities: Activities undertaken by or associated with whānau, hapū, or iwi that are conducted in accordance with tikanga.
Māori purpose zone: A specialised district plan zone in New Zealand designed to recognise, protect, and provide for the social, cultural, environmental, and economic aspirations of Mana Whenua, mataawaka, and tangata whenua on ancestral, general, Māori freehold, or Treaty settlement land.
Māori ancestral land: Land that has a deep, intergenerational connection to Māori whānau, hapū, or iwi through whakapapa and traditional custom.
Māori Housing Network: A program established by Te Puni Kōkiri to support whānau, hapū, iwi, and rōpū in achieving their housing aspirations.
Māori Land Court: New Zealand's specialist court of record that hears matters relating to the status, ownership, management, and use of Māori land.
MBIE: The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.
NES-P: The Resource Management, National Environmental Standards for Papakāinga Regulations 2026.
Natural hazards: Any atmospheric, earth, or water-related occurrence that adversely affects human life, property, or the environment.
Permitted activity: An action allowed under the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA), regional or district plans, or national environmental standards that can be carried out without needing a resource consent.
Restricted discretionary: An action under the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) is an activity that requires a resource consent. However, the local council limits its review to a specific, pre-defined list of matters.
Resource consent: An official authorisation from a local council in New Zealand to carry out an activity that may affect the environment and is not explicitly allowed "as of right" (permitted) under a district or regional plan.
Stage: Dividing a large project into distinct, sequential implementation phases rather than constructing everything all at once.
Setbacks: The minimum distance a building or structure must be set back from a property line, street, road, river, or other protected zone.
Stormwater: The rainfall or melting snow that runs off impermeable, hard surfaces such as roofs, roads, driveways, footpaths, and compacted soils rather than soaking into the ground.
Surveyor: A professional trained to measure, map, and analyse land, boundaries, buildings, and physical features.
Site constraints: The physical, environmental, legal, and infrastructural limits of a specific piece of land that dictate what can be designed, approved, and built.
Wastewater: Used water that flows from residential, commercial, and industrial properties into a drainage and sewer network.
Water supply: The safe provision, storage, reticulation, and delivery of hot and cold water to and within a building.
Zoning: The primary land-use planning tool used by local and regional authorities to divide land into spatial zones and apply rules that dictate how property can be used, developed, or protected.