Session Description
The Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) was, for over three decades, New Zealand's primary vehicle for environmental assessment - and the Assessment of Environmental Effects (AEE) its central instrument. As the RMA is now being replaced, the international impact assessment community has a rare opportunity to evaluate a complete arc of reform: from the Act's ambitious, effects-based origins through three decades of contested practice to its eventual replacement.
This panel brings together practitioners who have worked across the RMA's full span - from consenting major infrastructure and urban development to freshwater, coastal, and ecological contexts - to ask what the international IA community should learn from Aotearoa's experiment.
Key themes include:
- The promise and practice of integrated, effects-based assessment: did the AEE deliver what the RMA intended?
- The persistent tension between process efficiency and assessment quality, and whether successive RMA reforms resolved or worsened it
- Whether the incoming two-Bill framework — a Planning Bill and a Natural Environment Bill — preserves or diminishes what was most valuable in the AEE approach
The session draws on institutional memory spanning more than 30 years of multi-sector practice — from contaminated land and major infrastructure to ecological assessment and climate risk — and offers candid, practitioner-led reflection for an international audience navigating the evolution of their own frameworks.
Session Summary
As New Zealand replaces its environmental legislation after 35 years, this panel reflects on what its assessment framework achieved and where it fell short. Practitioners with experience across the Act’s lifespan explore its legacy and the lessons the international IA community can carry forward.
Additional Information
We have suggested this as a panel, we are open to other format suggestions if this is useful.
Session Chair
Reuben Hansen
Tonkin + Taylor
New Zealand