CoREs Announced; Māori Research Future Uncertain

CoREs Announced; Māori Research Future Uncertain

Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga (NPM) extends its congratulations to the six Centres of Research Excellence (CoREs) whose funding was announced by the Tertiary Education Commission yesterday. NPM recognises that each one of these centres will make a significant contribution to the nation and that New Zealand as a whole will benefit from their important endeavours.

Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga (NPM) extends its congratulations to the six Centres of Research Excellence (CoREs) whose funding was announced by the Tertiary Education Commission yesterday. NPM recognises that each one of these centres will make a significant contribution to the nation and that New Zealand as a whole will benefit from their important endeavours.

NPM is proud to have been a CoRE since 2002 and under this model has supported and produced high quality, evidence based research that is truly multi-disciplinary. Through this experience NPM expects the CoREs announced yesterday will deliver excellent outcomes in their specialised areas of health, photonics and quantum technologies, nanotechnology and working with large complex data sets. Their contribution to scientific research and scholarship and the benefit that then accrues to the broader community will be significant. Research will continue to be the basis for the future well-being and prosperity of this country.

While New Zealand will be well served by these CoREs the decision not to refund Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga, the country’s only Māori Centre of Research Excellence, creates significant gaps in the research landscape. The loss of a research field that uses new approaches, Māori knowledge and methods which have only recently become embedded in international scholarship. The substantial decline in funding for Māori led excellent research may mean a return to a fragmented Māori research environment that will struggle to meet the significant challenges and opportunities that the nation faces.
“Given the critical importance of Māori research in meeting national goals of economic and social development it is essential that Māori research has a secure and comprehensive funding base,” said Associate Professor Tracey McIntosh, Acting Director of NPM.

“Ngā Pae’s network of scholars provides a disciplinary reach that spans the hard sciences right through to the humanities and the social sciences with foundations of Māori values, perspectives and knowledge. As a research community we need to be able to deliver adaptive, evidence informed solutions that align with Māori aspirations and deliver social, cultural and economic benefit across society.”

“The future of Māori research, which ensures that innovation and benefit to the nation are captured, will remain uncertain until future research monies are guaranteed”.

Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga (NPM) is a Centre of Research Excellence consisting of 16 participating research entities and hosted by the University of Auckland. NPM conducts research of relevance to Māori and to New Zealand and is an important vehicle by which New Zealand continues to play a leadership role in global indigenous scholarship and related activities. Its research is underpinned by the vision to draw on the potential of Māori research to serve its broad communities and to bring about positive change and transformation in the nation and wider world. Visit www.maramatanga.ac.nz
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