New Zealand has competitive international teams in rugby union, rugby league, netball, cricket, softball, and sailing. Māori participation in European sports was particularly evident in rugby, and the country’s team performs a haka, a traditional Māori challenge, before international matches. Horse racing is one of the most popular spectator sports in New Zealand and was part of the “rugby, racing, and beer” subculture during the 1960s. The highest-grossing New Zealand films are Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Boy, The World’s Fastest Indian, Whale Rider, Once Were Warriors, Tinā, Heavenly Creatures, What We Do in the Shadows and The Piano.
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I learned about New Zealand mainly in the films of Lord of the Rings. The South Island is a true delight, and we will definitely be back to visit. The Adventure Capital of New Zealand is Queenstown. The main ski field in the North Island is Mt Ruapehu, and off season, the town of Ohakune is a great hub for Mountain Biking and hiking.
In the First World War, New Zealand recorded the highest casualties per head of population of any combatant nation. Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand, and conveniently located in the centre of the country Dubbed the ‘City of Sails’, Auckland is New Zealand’s largest city and boasts a harbour and a coast just 40 mins apart Welcome to New Zealand – Tourism.org.nz is your gateway to discovering the stunning beauty and vibrant culture of Aotearoa, New Zealand. What makes New Zealand a unique country to travel to? The North Island also has mountain ranges, and four volcanic peaks, including Mt. Ruapehu, which has been active (but not dangerous) since September 1995.
- Because of its long isolation from the rest of the world, New Zealand has unique flora.
- DNA mapping of their Maori descendants indicates links to the indigenous people of Taiwan.
- The Māori loanword Pākehā has been used to refer to New Zealanders of European descent, although some reject this name.
- From the early 20th century until the late 1960s, Māori culture was suppressed by the attempted assimilation of Māori into British New Zealanders.
- The Ross Dependency is New Zealand’s territorial claim in Antarctica, where it operates the Scott Base research facility.
For instance, in 2016, Auckland was ranked the world’s third most liveable city and Wellington the twelfth by the Mercer Quality of Living Survey. Most private and commercial research organisations in New Zealand focus on the agricultural and fisheries sectors. Their role is to research and develop new science, knowledge, products and services across the economic, environmental, social and cultural spectrum for the benefit of New Zealand.
The early European settlers divided New Zealand into provinces, which had a degree of autonomy. One example of structural inequality in New Zealand can be seen in the criminal justice system. The New Zealand Human Rights Commission has asserted that there is strong, consistent evidence that structural discrimination is a real and ongoing socioeconomic issue. But this is untrue of local council elections; a historically low 36% of eligible New Zealanders voted in the 2022 local elections, compared with an already low 42% turnout in 2019. New Zealand ranks highly for civic participation in the political process, with 82% voter turnout during recent general elections, compared to an OECD average of 69%. New Zealand’s judiciary, headed by the chief justice, includes the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, the betista casino login High Court, and subordinate courts.
Regions and external territories
The first European visitor to New Zealand, Dutch explorer Abel Tasman, named the islands Staten Land, believing they were part of the Staten Landt that Jacob Le Maire had sighted off the southern end of South America. Between about 1280 and 1350, Polynesians began to settle in the islands and subsequently developed a distinctive Māori culture. The Maori language is used on sign posts, at Maori culture concerts, as secondary names of government departments, on the Maori-language television channel, and on a number of tribal radio stations. New Zealand’s landscape ranges from the fjord-like sounds of the southwest to the tropical beaches of the far north.
Ethnicity and immigration
The two main islands are named North and South islands in English, or Te-Ika-a-Maui and Te Wai Pounamu, respectively, in Maori. Discover vibrant cities like the largest city Auckland and capital city Wellington, where culture and entertainment thrive. New Zealand is about 1,000 miles (1,600 km) long (north-south) and about 280 miles (450 km) across at its widest point. New Zealand was the largest country in Polynesia when it was annexed by Great Britain in 1840. Participation in the world wars gave some New Zealand writers a new perspective on New Zealand culture and with the postwar expansion of universities local literature flourished.
It also forms the southwestern extremity of the geographic and ethnographic region called Polynesia. New Zealand is part of Zealandia, a microcontinent nearly half the size of Australia that gradually submerged after breaking away from the Gondwanan supercontinent. The country owes its varied topography, and perhaps even its emergence above the waves, to the dynamic boundary it straddles between the Pacific and Indo-Australian Plates. The highly active Taupō Volcanic Zone has formed a large volcanic plateau, punctuated by the North Island’s highest mountain, Mount Ruapehu (2,797 metres (9,177 ft)). The closest point between any territory of both countries is between Macquarie Island (Australia) and Auckland Island (New Zealand), which are about 618 kilometers (384 miles) apart.
New Zealand art and craft has gradually achieved an international audience, with exhibitions in the Venice Biennale in 2001 and the “Paradise Now” exhibition in New York in 2004. Certain items of popular culture thought to be unique to New Zealand are called “Kiwiana”. In the 1960s, as tertiary education became more available, and cities expanded urban culture began to dominate, but rural imagery and themes are common in New Zealand’s art, literature and media. From the early 20th century until the late 1960s, Māori culture was suppressed by the attempted assimilation of Māori into British New Zealanders. More recently, American, Australian, Asian and other European cultures have exerted influence on New Zealand.
- The currency is the New Zealand dollar, informally known as the “Kiwi dollar”; it also circulates in the Cook Islands (see Cook Islands dollar), Niue, Tokelau, and the Pitcairn Islands.
- Non-Māori Polynesian cultures are also apparent, with Pasifika, the world’s largest Polynesian festival, now an annual event in Auckland.
- New Zealand television primarily broadcasts American and British programming, along with many Australian and local shows.
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- The New Zealand Post Office had a monopoly over telecommunications in New Zealand until 1987 when Telecom New Zealand was formed, initially as a state-owned enterprise and then privatised in 1990.
- The main ski field in the North Island is Mt Ruapehu, and off season, the town of Ohakune is a great hub for Mountain Biking and hiking.
- How big is the New Zealand economy?
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New Zealand administers the South Pacific island group of Tokelau and claims a section of the Antarctic continent. The capital city is Wellington and the largest urban area Auckland; both are located on the North Island. New Zealand is a remote land—one of the last sizable territories suitable for habitation to be populated and settled—and lies more than 1,000 miles (1,600 km) southeast of Australia, its nearest neighbour.
The population, in slight excess of four million, is similar in size to Costa Rica’s. New Zealand’s total land area, nearly 270,000 km², is about the same as that of Colorado and somewhat smaller than the Philippines. The closest neighbors to the north are New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. It is separated from Australia to the northwest by the Tasman Sea, which is some 2,000 km across.
Since human arrival, almost half of the country’s vertebrate species have become extinct, including at least 51 birds, three frogs, three lizards, one freshwater fish, and one bat. More penguin species are found in New Zealand than in any other country, with 13 of the world’s 18 penguin species. The flora and fauna of New Zealand were originally thought to have originated from New Zealand’s fragmentation off from Gondwana; however, more recent evidence postulates species resulted from dispersal.
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It is also called Aotearoa or the “Land of the Long White Cloud” in the language of the Maori (rhymes with “dowry”), the Polynesian people who settled the islands four centuries before the first Europeans arrived. New Zealand is an island country located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country comprises two main islands—the North and the South Island—and a number of small islands, some of them hundreds of miles from the main group. New Zealand, island country in the South Pacific Ocean, the southwesternmost part of Polynesia. New Zealand’s population today is concentrated to the north of the country, with around 76.4% of the population living in the North Island and 23.6% in the South Island as of June 2025. New Zealand conservationists have pioneered several methods to help threatened wildlife recover, including island sanctuaries, pest control, wildlife translocation, fostering, and ecological restoration of islands and other protected areas.
The government has negotiated settlements of these grievances with many iwi, although Māori claims to the foreshore and seabed proved controversial in the 2000s. A Māori protest movement developed, which criticised Eurocentrism and worked for greater recognition of Māori culture and of the Treaty of Waitangi. New Zealand experienced increasing prosperity following the Second World War, and Māori began to leave their traditional rural life and move to the cities in search of work.
Early European maps labelled the islands North (North Island), Middle (South Island), and South (Stewart Island / Rakiura). The service sector dominates the country’s economy, followed by the industrial sector, and agriculture; international tourism is also a significant source of revenue. Today, the majority of New Zealand’s population of around 5.3 million is of European descent; the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pasifika. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island (Te Ika-a-Māui) and the South Island (Te Waipounamu)—and over 600 smaller islands.
Almost all general elections between 1853 and 1993 were held under the first-past-the-post voting system. Cabinet, formed by ministers and led by the prime minister, is the highest policy-making body in government and responsible for deciding significant government actions. If no majority is formed, a minority government can be formed if support from other parties during confidence and supply votes is assured. The House of Representatives is democratically elected, and a government is formed from the party or coalition with the majority of seats. The New Zealand Parliament holds legislative power and consists of the king and the House of Representatives.
New Zealand participated at the Summer Olympics in 1908 and 1912 as a joint team with Australia, before first participating on its own in 1920. The Polynesian sport of waka ama racing has experienced a resurgence of interest in New Zealand since the 1980s. New Zealand is known for its extreme sports, adventure tourism and strong mountaineering tradition, as seen in the success of notable New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary summiting Mount Everest first. Golf, netball, tennis and cricket have the highest rates of adult participation, while netball, rugby union and football (soccer) are particularly popular among young people. A hāngī is a traditional Māori method of cooking food using heated rocks buried in a pit oven that is still used for large groups on special occasions, such as tangihanga. New Zealand yields produce from land and sea—most crops and livestock, such as maize, potatoes and pigs, were gradually introduced by the early European settlers.
Because of its long isolation from the rest of the world, New Zealand has unique flora. The tallest peak on North Island is Mount Ruapehu (2,797 m), an active, cone-shaped volcano. South Island is dominated by the Southern Alps, the highest peak of which is Aoraki/Mount Cook, at 3,754 m. New Zealand aligned itself with the allied nations in World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. Maori legends describe South Island as a canoe and North Island as a fish.