The new legislation has created 19 new protection areas: 12 new High Protection Areas (HPAs), five new seafloor protection areas and two marine reserve extensions.
Considering the increasingly degraded state of these waters, the legislation, which came into effect in October, was long overdue.
It adds 1586sq km of new protection, ranging from the waters surrounding the Mokohīnau Islands in the north to the Aldermen Islands in the Coromandel and critical habitats closer to Auckland.
Around 7% of the Hauraki Gulf is now fully protected, up from less than 3% before the new legislation came into effect. Graphic / Aaron Bryan / DoC
The bill was not without its detractors, who criticised everything from customary rights for tāngata whenua, to allowing limited commercial fishing within two High Protection Areas.
In November, a convoy of around 500 vehicles, many towing boats, travelled from Albany, across the Auckland Harbour Bridge to Mission Bay to protest against aspects of the legislation.
But on that December evening at the yacht squadron, it was nothing but smiles and buzz. From iwi to activists, scientists to politicians, we were all there to toast this win for nature.
Together, the new HPAs cover an area larger than metropolitan Auckland, according to Alex Rogers, the Department of Conservation’s director of operations for Tāmaki Makaurau and former executive officer of the Hauraki Gulf Forum.
“That’s a 20-fold increase in marine protection from the area covered by the existing six Marine Reserves, such as Goat Island or Cathedral Cove,” he told the Herald.
Nearly seven years ago, I bought a tiny patch of land on Rakino, an island that sits between Motutapu and the Noises.
Elisabeth Easther and son Theo snorkelling at the Noises, in the Hauraki Gulf. Photo / Lorna Doogan
In that time, I’ve become familiar with the shores and reefs of Rakino, and I’ve made life-long, like-minded friends. I’ve also learned that things aren’t as pristine as they appear on the surface, and beneath those sparking blue waters, delicate ecosystems are in peril.
Kina barrens have taken over where kelp once flourished, because populations of the natural predators of sea urchins, notably snapper/tāmure and crayfish/kōura have been decimated.
So depleted are the crayfish, they’re considered functionally extinct in the gulf, which means there aren’t enough of them to maintain a viable population. With those crucial kelp habitats so degraded, the ocean is losing mauri, its vital life force.
That’s not all. Seabirds – including cormorants, penguins and gulls – are starving because humans have taken too much of their kai (prosaically referred to as baitfish).
This is an ecological disaster, with seabirds essential to a balanced ecosystem. I’ll never forget hearing seabird scientist Dr Matt Rayner explain how the birds’ poo feeds phytoplankton and zooplankton, tiny organisms that then become food for bigger creatures all the way up to whales and dolphins.
Rayner calls this a “circular economy”, and without all the pieces of that puzzle in place, the consequences are devastating. A healthy ocean also produces oxygen, an estimated one of every two breaths we take.
As my Rakino roots deepened, I became friends with the Neureuter family from the Noises, a chain of islands about a 30-minute paddle from Rakino.
Sue Neureuter’s family has been connected to the Noises since the early 1930s, and she’s been visiting them all her life.
“When I was young, the marine life seemed abundant, with baitfish to seabirds, kelp forests to kingfish,” she says. “But according to our dad, it was nothing compared to how it was when he was a boy.”
A young Sue Neureuter with her mother, Margaret.
The more I learned, the more I cared. Soon, I was writing blogs and newsletters for the Noises’ communications project.
Wheels were in motion. Groups were starting to lobby the Government for marine protection, and the Noises team wanted to share every bit of information they could gather to support the cause.
“Throughout the year, except for when the weather was bad, the Noises would be surrounded by boats,” Neureuter says.
She has an aerial photo taken on a Sunday in July 2011 that shows 85 boats in the area, all fishing.
“My siblings and I knew, if something wasn’t done to protect the waters, there’d be nothing left to save.”
From kelp studies to seabird surveys, mussel restoration to coastal erosion mitigation, one message remained constant: the marine ecosystem was in dire straits as a result of overfishing.
Combine that with sedimentation from development, ocean acidification, warming temperatures, noise pollution and many other factors, the future of the moana looked bleak.
Neureuter says that from about the 1990s, the damage was impossible to ignore.
“I’d also been spending time between the 80s and 90s sailing around the Pacific, where I was also seeing shocking environmental change,” she says.
“So to come home with the benefit of perspective and see the same things, I became more aware how bad things were, and that something had to be done.”
People have been advocating for marine conservation for decades, but the push for protection began in earnest about 13 years ago with the introduction of the Sea Change Plan, a collaborative marine spatial plan for the Hauraki Gulf.
After teaming up with iwi and scientists, Neureuter says, the extent of the loss became evident – and not just at the Noises.
Dr Tim Haggitt, who manages the University of Auckland’s Marine Discovery Centre at Motu Hāwere/Goat Island in Leigh, has also witnessed the degradation first-hand.
“Over the last two decades within Tīkapa Moana, our monitoring has measured an alarming decrease in numerous species, including spiny rock lobster, the natural predator of kina,” he says.
“One way to reverse that decline is by implementing marine protection to help build greater ecosystem resilience – which is essential in the face of an unpredictable future, with everything from warming seas to worsening storms that are a result of climate change.”
In spite of opposition to the new legislation, the act’s supporters are confident most detractors will change their views when they see the improvements it makes.
“The great thing about marine protection,” says Haggitt, “is that by putting reserves in productive areas, you don’t have to do anything, apart from not fish. And over time, as we’ve seen at Motu Hāwere/Goat Island and other reserves, the ecosystem will rebalance naturally.”
Over the coming months, there’ll be more celebrations on islands and shorelines and the obligatory grumbling from anglers who can’t fish their old haunts.
“If the HPAs do their job and biodiversity within them increases, they should become fish pumps for the surrounding waters,” says Rogers. “But that will also depend in part on how we manage fishing, and stem flows of sediment and pollution from washing into the gulf.”
Sue Neureuter, whose family has been visiting the Noises since the 1930s. Photo / Kate Evans
Today, the HPA around the Noises covers about 60 sq km (6000ha). That’s 10 times bigger than the original marine reserve at Leigh, says Neureuter, who’s still finding it hard to believe the legislation has finally passed.
“On this journey, I became a reluctant spokesperson,” she tells me. “We don’t know what will happen, but we’re certain it will be positive.
“I’ll be happy to pull back, while still supporting mana whenua and DoC, and the people who will be kaitiaki of this precious place for future generations.”
Marking 50 years of marine protection
In October 1975, the world’s first legislated no-take marine reserve was established around Te Hāwere-a-Maki/Goat Island in Leigh, north of Auckland, when a million fewer people lived in Tāmaki Makaurau than there are today.
The year before the Cape Rodney-Okakari Point Marine Reserve was created, Auckland University had established its marine lab there. The once-thriving rocky reef was already becoming barren, which is why foresighted scientists, seafarers and sea carers pushed for protection.
As with today, there was resistance then too. However, the results speak for themselves. Higher densities of fish and other marine life are found within the reserve’s boundaries, despite significant fishing pressure on its perimeter from recreational and commercial fishing. Some people have been caught fishing inside the reserve.
In 2000, the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park / Tīkapa Moana was established. However, that 1.2 million ha area wasn’t protected.
The designation was more an acknowledgement of the significance and the precious nature of those waters, the motu and the coastal mainland, so little really changed. However, the act also established the Hauraki Gulf Forum.
Rogers, who was executive officer from 2019 to 2024, says the forum had the important job of proving beyond all doubt that the health of the Hauraki Gulf was declining, and the reasons why.
“We had to make the case for marine protection and restoration so strong, and so well supported, that action simply had to follow.”
With the Hauraki Gulf/Tīkapa Moana Marine Protection Act now enshrined in law, the dial has shifted significantly, from less than 3% of the gulf protected to around 7% now under full protection. This edges us closer to the internationally recognised target of 30%, and that is something to celebrate.
Nicola Rata-MacDonald, chief executive of the Ngāti Manuhiri Settlement Trust and co-chair of the Hauraki Gulf Forum, summed it up eloquently in her speech at the yacht squadron that day.
“We’re all part of one big sea village – like pilchards or herrings,“ she said.
”Because when we all work together, we might be small individually, but every contribution can make a positive shift in a giant system.”
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