New Zealand’s Changing Coastline

We currently have an incomplete knowledge of how our coastline is changing, where and at what rate. Coastal erosion is a significant hazard facing coastal communities throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. The risk exposure of coastal communities and infrastructure is rapidly increasing as sea-level rise accelerates and a legacy of poor coastal planning decisions takes effect.

We are creating a national coastal-change database to understand the nature and causes of past changes and to maintain a record of ongoing changes to help anticipate the future. To achieve this, we are:

• creating a publicly available geo-referenced database to record a sequence of detailed snapshots of Aotearoa New Zealand’s entire 15,000 km coastline to identify how fast our coastline is changing, and which areas are most prone to erosion
• developing new semi-automated tools that use satellite images and onsite monitoring to detect coastal change
• undertaking case study analyses of Māori oral histories of coastal change
• exploring the underlying causes of coastal change to underpin projections of future change.

Our goal is for our publicly available database of past and ongoing coastal change to be used by planners and decision-makers when deciding how to best plan for our changing coastline.

Ināianei he hukihuki tā mātou mātauranga mō te hurihanga o tō tātou takutai, ki hea, ā, pēhea te tere. He mōrearea nui te ngāhorohoro o te takutai e pā nei ki ngā hapori noho ki tai puta noa i Aotearoa. Kei te tere piki haere te pānga o te tūraru ki ngā hapori noho ki tai me te tūāhanga hoki i te tere o te pikinga o te paemoana me te pāpātanga o ngā whakataunga whakamahere koretake o mua.

E waihanga ana mātou i tētahi pātengi raraunga mō te hurihanga-takutai kia mārama ai ki te āhua me te pūtake o ngā hurihanga o mua me te pupuri i tētahi pūkete mō ngā hurihanga moroki hei matapae i te anamata. Hei whakatutuki i tēnei, e pēnei ana mātou:

• e waihanga ana i tētahi pātengi raraunga tūtohu matawhenua tūmatanui hei hopu i tētahi raupapatanga whakaahua o ngā kiromita 15,000 katoa o te takutai moana o Aotearoa hei tautohu i te tere o te hurihanga o te takutai, ā, ko ēhea ngā wāhi e tino pāngia ana e te ngāhorohoro
• e whakawhanake ana i ngā taputapu āhua-aunoa e whakamahi ana i ngā whakaahua amiorangi me te aroturuki ā-tauwāhi kia kite ai i ngā hurihanga o te takutai
• e whakahaere ana i ngā tātaritanga rangahau mō ngā kōrero tuku iho a te Māori mō te hurihanga o te takutai moana
• e tūhura ana i ngā pūtake o te hurihanga o te takutai moana hei pūtake mō ngā matapae o ngā hurihanga o anamata.

Ko te whāinga mō tā mātou pātengi raraunga tūmatanui mō ngā hurihanga takutai o mua, moroki hoki, ka whakamahia e ngā kaiwhakamahere me ngā kaiwhakatau i a rātou e whakatau i te ara tika hei whakamahere mō ngā hurihanga o tō tātou takutai moana.