Ko au te awa, ko te awa ko au: Te Awa Tupua

Whanganui iwi have a saying: 'Ko au te awa, ko te awa ko au.' I am the river, and the river is me. It means the wellbeing of the people and the wellbeing of the river cannot be separated.

A river as an ancestor

For Whanganui iwi, the river is a tupuna (ancestor) with its own mauri, or life force. It is not just the water, but the whole river from the mountains to the sea: its bed, its banks, its tributaries and everything that lives in it. Hapū along the river each care for their own stretch, like strands woven into one rope.

A long fight

After 1840, people who did not know the river as an ancestor started making decisions about it. Gravel was dug from the bed, rapids were blasted for riverboats, and water from the headwaters was diverted for hydroelectric power. From the 1870s Whanganui iwi petitioned Parliament and went to court to protect the river. It became one of the longest-running legal disputes in the country.

The 2017 law

In March 2017 Parliament passed the Te Awa Tupua Act. It recognised the river as 'an indivisible and living whole' with the rights of a legal person. That means the river can, in effect, own itself and be represented in decisions.

Not the only one

Te Urewera, a forest in the eastern North Island, was recognised in a similar way in 2014, and Taranaki Maunga in 2025. People around the world now study Te Awa Tupua as a new way for law to protect nature.