Taranaki Region facts for kids
Taranaki is a region on the west side of New Zealand's North Island. It's managed by the Taranaki Regional Council. The region gets its name from its most famous natural feature, the volcano called Mount Taranaki.
The main city in Taranaki is New Plymouth. More than 65% of the people in Taranaki live in the New Plymouth area. New Plymouth is in North Taranaki, along with towns like Inglewood and Waitara. Towns in South Taranaki include Hawera, Stratford, Eltham, and Opunake.
Since 2005, Taranaki has used the slogan "Like no other" to promote itself.
Contents
Geography of Taranaki
Taranaki is located on the west coast of the North Island, wrapped around its central volcano. The region covers an area of 7,258 square kilometers. The large bays to the north-west and south-west of Cape Egmont are called the North Taranaki Bight and the South Taranaki Bight.
Mount Taranaki (also known as Mount Egmont) is the second tallest mountain in the North Island. It's the most important natural feature of the region. A Māori legend says that Taranaki once lived with the Tongariro, Ngauruhoe, and Ruapehu mountains in the middle of the North Island. But after a fight with Tongariro, Taranaki moved to its current spot. The mountain has a nearly perfect cone shape. It last erupted in the mid-1700s. The mountain and the land right around it make up Egmont National Park.
Māori people had called the mountain Taranaki for many centuries. Captain James Cook later renamed it Egmont after the Earl of Egmont. The Earl was a government official who had supported Cook's journey. Today, the mountain has two official names: "Mount Taranaki" and "Mount Egmont".
The region has very rich soil and gets a lot of rain, which makes it very fertile. Dairy farming is the main type of farming here. Fonterra's Whareroa milk factory near Hawera makes more dairy ingredients than any other single factory in the world. Taranaki also has oil and gas underground and offshore. The Maui gas field off the south-west coast has supplied most of New Zealand's gas. It also once supported two methanol plants at Motunui. More fuel and fertilizer come from a well-complex at Kapuni and other smaller oil fields on land. As the Maui field runs low, new offshore sources have been found. These include the Tui field, 50 km south of Hawera, and the Pohokura gas field, 4.5 km north of Waitara.
Because the land sticks out into the Tasman Sea, it gets waves from the north, west, and south. This creates many excellent spots for surfing and windsurfing, some of which are known worldwide.
People of Taranaki
Taranaki has a population of 121,000 as of Statistics New Zealand's June 2018. This is about 2.5 percent of New Zealand's total population. It is the tenth most populated region in New Zealand. The average age of people in Taranaki is 39.9 years, which is two years older than the New Zealand average. About 16.2 percent of the population is 65 or older, while 21.1 percent is under 15. In 2013, there were 95.7 males for every 100 females in Taranaki.
Main Towns and Cities
Almost half of Taranaki's residents live in New Plymouth. Hawera is the only other town in the region with more than 10,000 people.
| Urban area | Population (June 2018) |
% of region |
|---|---|---|
| New Plymouth | 58,300 | 48.2% |
| Hawera | 12,150 | 10.0% |
| Waitara | 7,040 | 5.8% |
| Stratford | 5,740 | 4.7% |
| Inglewood | 3,630 | 3.0% |
| Eltham | 2,070 | 1.7% |
| Opunake | 1,360 | 1.1% |
| Patea | 1,160 | 1.0% |
Culture and People
Quick facts for kids Largest groups of overseas-born residents |
|
| Nationality | Population (2013) |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom |
5,328 |
 Australia |
1,560 |
 South Africa |
939 |
 Philippines |
624 |
 India |
579 |
 Fiji |
483 |
 China |
480 |
 Netherlands |
441 |
 United States |
351 |
 Canada |
210 |
The Māori people have lived in this region for many centuries. The local iwi (which are like tribes or large family groups) include Ngāti Mutunga, Ngāti Maru, Ngāti Ruanui, Taranaki, Te Āti Awa, Nga Rauru, Ngāruahinerangi, and Ngāti Tama.
About 50.2 percent of Taranaki's population are Christians. About 2.7 percent follow other religions, while 43.8 percent do not follow any religion. Catholicism is the largest Christian group, with 15.5 percent of people belonging to it. Anglicanism is the second largest, with 13.5 percent.
History of Taranaki
Māori tribes began living in the Taranaki area around the 13th century. From about 1823, Māori started meeting European whalers and traders. These traders arrived by schooner (a type of sailing ship) to buy flax. In March 1828, a trader named Richard "Dicky" Barrett set up a trading post at Ngamotu, which is now part of New Plymouth. Barrett and his group had muskets and cannons. The Āti Awa tribe welcomed them because they could help in their ongoing battles with Waikato Māori. After a big fight at Ngamotu in 1832, most of the 2,000 Āti Awa people living near Ngamotu, along with Barrett, moved south to the Kapiti region and Marlborough.
In late 1839, Barrett came back to Taranaki. He was working for the New Zealand Company, which had already started selling land to future settlers in England. The company expected to get legal ownership of this land. Barrett said he had bought a large area stretching from Mokau to Cape Egmont, and inland to the upper parts of the Whanganui River, including Mt Taranaki. A later agreement included New Plymouth and all the coastal lands of North Taranaki, including Waitara.
European settlement in New Plymouth began when the ship William Bryan arrived in March 1841. However, Europeans found it hard to expand beyond New Plymouth because Māori did not want to sell their land. This feeling grew stronger as Māori connected more with the King Movement. Disagreements over land ownership kept growing, leading to the start of the First Taranaki War at Waitara in March 1860. The desire for land in Taranaki caused the conflict. But the bigger reason for the war was the government's wish to make Māori follow British rules and laws.
More than 3,500 imperial troops from Australia, along with volunteer soldiers and local fighters, fought in the war. They fought against Māori forces, which ranged from a few hundred to about 1,500 people. Around 238 imperial, volunteer, and local troops were lost. Māori casualties were about 200.
A difficult peace was made a year later. But it broke in April 1863 when land disagreements started again. In the Second Taranaki War, 5,000 troops fought against about 1,500 Māori men, women, and children. The fighting style was different this time. The army systematically took Māori land by forcing people to leave. They used a "scorched earth" strategy, destroying Māori villages and farms, whether the people were fighting or not. As the troops moved forward, the government built more forts. Behind these forts, settlers built homes and developed farms. This led to the gradual taking of almost a million acres (4,000 square kilometers) of land.
The main highway on the inland side of Mount Taranaki today follows the path taken by colonial forces under Major General Trevor Chute. They marched with great difficulty from Patea to New Plymouth in 1866.
Armed Māori resistance continued in South Taranaki until early 1869. It was led by the warrior Titokowaru, who took back land almost as far south as Wanganui. Ten years later, the spiritual leader Te Whiti o Rongomai, based at Parihaka, started a peaceful protest against the government taking land. This protest ended when colonial troops raided Parihaka on November 5, 1881.
The land confiscations, which the New Zealand Government later said were unfair and illegal, began in 1865. Soon, they included the entire Taranaki district. Towns like Normanby, Hawera, and Carlyle (Patea) were built on land taken for military settlements. A Waitangi Tribunal report in 1996 looked into this situation. This report led to some discussion. The government has since worked to address these historical injustices.
Taranaki's Economy
The total value of goods and services produced in the Taranaki region (its sub-national GDP) was about NZ$8.3 billion in 2016. This made up 3.3% of New Zealand's total GDP. This was a decrease from NZ$9.2 billion and 4% in 2014. Taranaki had the biggest drop in GDP of any region in the 2015-16 financial year.
However, as of 2016, Taranaki still has the highest GDP per person of any region in New Zealand.
The main things that contribute to Taranaki's economy are dairy farming and finding and using oil and gas.
How Taranaki is Governed
Past Provincial Government
From 1853, the Taranaki region was governed as the Taranaki Province. It was first called the New Plymouth Province. This system lasted until New Zealand's provinces were removed in 1876. The main leader was called the superintendent.
Here is a list of the superintendents of the Taranaki Province during that time:
| Superintendent | Term |
|---|---|
| Charles Brown | 1853–1857 |
| George Cutfield | 1857–1861 |
| Charles Brown | 1861–1865 |
| Henry Robert Richmond | 1865–1869 |
| Frederic Carrington | 1869–1876 |
Taranaki Regional Council
The Taranaki Regional Council was created in November 1989 as part of big changes to local government across New Zealand. Its main job is to manage the region's natural resources, like water and land. The regional council took over from several smaller local groups that were closed down. The Council's main office was set up in Stratford. This central location was chosen to help bring together the northern and southern parts of Taranaki.
Chairmen
- Ross Leslie Allen (1989–2001)
- David Walter (2001–2007)
- David MacLeod (2007–present)
Māori Language in Taranaki
The Māori language spoken in Taranaki has a special feature. Instead of the "h" sound (both on its own and in "wh"), people use a short break in the sound. For example, the famous elder Hina Okeroa was known as Ina. The name of the river flowing through New Plymouth, Waiwakaiho, would be written Waiwhakaiho (meaning "water flowing downward") in the Māori spoken in the central North Island.
Taranaki in Movies
Taranaki's beautiful landscape and the mountain's similar look to Mount Fuji in Japan led to it being chosen as a filming location. The movie The Last Samurai, which is set in 19th-century Japan, was filmed here. The movie starred Tom Cruise.
See also
In Spanish: Región de Taranaki para niños
