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Nā te kaha tāmia o ngā iwi taketake puta i te ao ki
ngā whakahaere kāwanatanga me ngā tikanga ōhanga o
tauiwi, kua āhua ngoikore ā rātou ake āhuatanga
tōrangpū, ōhanga, hinengaro hoki, e taea e rātou te wero,
te tū pakari ki mua i te kākiri haere o ngā pūnaha me ngā
whakahaere manene e takahi nei i ā rātou ake tikanga
tae atu anā ki te taiao a-nuku.
Ina tirohia ngā tatauranga mā te āhua o te noho o te
iwi Māori me tauiwi i Aotearoa nei, tēra e kitea tēnei tū
āhuatanga kua pā kite iwi Māori i roto i te 150 tau o
mua.
Nā te pānga o te heke o te taha tūnana, te taha
hinengaro me te taha wairua o te iwi Māori ki te ngaro
haere o ngā taonga pērā i te whenua, te reo, te
mātauranga ake, me ngā rawa o te taiao, tēra e kitea atu
mā te whakahoki i te ora, me te whai wāhi anā o te Māori
ki ēnei āhuatanga, e tū pakari anā ai, e haere whakamua
ai te iwi Māori.
Kāore e kore, ko ngā kaupapa tōrangapū me ngā
whakahaere ōhanga hou e whāia ana puta i te ao, ka pā
kino atu ki te whai wāhitanga atu o te iwi Māori ki ēnei
taonga o rātou i roto i ngā tau kei te tū mai. Kāore e tino
rerekē ana te tāmia o ngā iwi taketake i ēnei rā ki ngā rā
o mua - kei te haere tonu, kei te haere tonu.
Ko tā te tuhinga nei, he titiro ki ēnei āhuatanga hou,
me te aro anā ki ngā ture e waihangatia ana e pā ana ki
te ao hokohoko me ngā mana whakairo hinengaro. Ko te
rangatiratanga ake o te Māori me tā te Māori whakatū i
ngā kaupapa koiora a-nuku, ka noho hei pūtake horopaki
mā ngā whakaaro ka puta.

Over time, forced immersion in the institutions of state
and market economies has rendered many indigenous
communities politically, economically and
psychologically bereft of the capacity to effectively
challenge the systems and methodologies that undermine
the integrity of their own natural and cultural
environments. For Māori, the battle scars of 150 years of
culturally inadequate policies and practices are easily
deciphered by comparing the social and economic indices
of Māori, with those of non-Māori. The positive
correlation between the physical, mental and spiritual
decline of Māori with the loss of tangible and intangible
cultural resources, like land, language, traditional
knowledge and natural resources, would suggest that the
future advancement and long-term wellbeing of Māori is
critically reliant upon continued and uninhibited access
to those resources that sustain and enhance the human
and non-human spheres of one's total cultural
environment. Changes taking place within the global
political economy, fuelled by rapid technological
developments and increasingly reliant upon the transfer
of information and knowledge, have the potential to inhibit
Māori access to these resources in the future. These
changes reveal that the colonisation and fragmentation
of indigenous culture is as prevalent and as powerful-aforce
today as it ever was in the past. This discussion is
intended as an overview of developments occurring within
the global economy as these pertain to the implementation
of unitary standards governing trade and investment
related intellectual property rights. This issue is explored
within the broader context of Māori rangatiratanga and
indigenous land-based biodiversity to reveal some of the
potentially momentous effects of these developments for
Māori.