What current methods do Māori (particularly those on low incomes and/or living in conditions of poverty) use to manage money?

What financial products and services are likely to be effective for Māori and how might these be successfully implemented?

What support can Māori organisations (including iwi) and the government provide to increase whānau financial literacy and savings?

Poverty within Māori communities is perpetuated by low incomes, poor financial literacy and a lack of whānau role models who encourage saving. For change to occur, financial education, collaborative community efforts and radical behavioural shifts are required.

This project explores the role that enterprise plays in indigenous self-determination. In New Zealand, we have chosen to examine Māori business networks (MBNs), which we argue are a manifestation of this struggle, but suffer from the absence of a sustainable business model. Our research question is, 'what is the role of Māori business networks in Māori self-determination and sustainable economic development'?

How can 21st century Māori self-determination and self-governance jurisdiction aspirations best be supported in law to assist with meeting strategic Māori community economic objectives of wealth and well-being?

What legal solutions and models can better support multi-dimensional and intergenerational wealth and wellbeing for whānau, hapū and iwi as envisaged in the Treaty of Waitangi and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples?

This summer intern research project explores from the perspective of Māori women, their understanding of the ‘Māori economy’ and the roles they have in developing intergenerational growth within the Small-to-medium sized sector.
Women have a vast and positive impact on the economy. Key research already undertaken through the Māori SME whai rawa project (The intergenerational reality of Māori SMEs) has identified that the Māori economy is made up from increasingly diverse socio-economic structures. Within those are a number of ways that individuals contribute and participate within the economic frameworks whether at iwi, hapū or whānau levels; paid employment or otherwise.

What is the potential for new governing structures to intervene in persisting social, cultural, political and economic inequalities that disproportionately accrue to Māori?

The multiple accountabilities of Māori leaders to whānau and community members, beneficiaries and external stakeholders make Māori governance challenges unique. Māori entities are collective, ancestry based and do not have easy exit mechanisms for owners and so Māori governance poses complex challenges.

What are the distinctive dimensions and drivers of innovative Māori leadership and integrated decision making, and how do these characteristics deliver pluralistic outcomes that advance transformative and prosperous Māori economies of wellbeing?

A diverse range of Māori leadership practices have contributed to the development of a Māori economy with a current estimated asset base of $42.6 billion, yet the role of mātauranga and tikanga Māori within leadership practices is poorly understood.

The overarching research question is: what constitutes entrepreneurial ecosystem efficacy with respect to indigenous entrepreneurs’ innovation intentions and activity? In order to investigate this overarching research question, the following questions will be explored: (i) how do Māori entrepreneurs think about innovation? (ii) How does enterprise assistance support Māori entrepreneurs’ to innovate? And (iii), what are the implications for enterprise assistance targeting Māori entrepreneurs?

We have identified a set of questions relating to indigenous data governance, ownership and access, along with potential solutions for benefit sharing and value generation.

What are the key challenges to realising indigenous data sovereignty and how might they be addressed?

What are the key mechanisms needed to realise indigenous data sovereignty at global, national and local scales?

What is the transformative potential of indigenous data sovereignty for Māori?

What can we learn from ‘best practice’ examples of indigenous data sovereignty that already exist?