New Zealand Recognizes a Mountain as a Legal Person

01New Zealand's parliament recently passed a law that gives a mountain all the rights and responsibilities of a human being.

02The indigenous Maori people of New Zealand consider the mountain their ancestor.

03The mountain is now known by its Maori name, Taranaki Maunga.

04The Maori people of New Zealand represent about 15% of the country's population.

05Taranaki Maunga is a dormant volcano on New Zealand's North Island.

06Snow covers the top of the 2,516-meter-high mountain.

07It is a popular place for tourism, hiking, and snow sports.

08The legal recognition of the mountain is one of the steps New Zealand's government has taken to make up for harm the indigenous population suffered in the past.

09The new law makes it known that the Taranaki area was stolen from the Maori after New Zealand was colonized.

10The new law gives Taranaki Maunga all the rights, powers, duties, responsibilities, and liabilities of a person.

11The law says a newly created group will be the face and voice of the mountain.

12Four members from local Maori tribes and four members appointed by the country's conservation minister will be in the group.

13Paul Goldsmith is the lawmaker responsible for the legal settlements between the government and Maori tribes.

14In a speech to Parliament, he said, The mountain has long been an honored ancestor, a source of physical, cultural, and spiritual sustenance, and a final resting place.

15Britain colonized New Zealand in the 1700s and 1800s.

16In 1770, the British explorer Captain James Cook named the volcano Mount Egmont.

17In 1840, Maori tribes and representatives of the British government signed the Treaty of Waitangi.

18The treaty promised the Maori would keep the rights to their land and resources.

19However, the British government began breaking parts of the treaty after that.

20In 1865, the government took a large area of Taranaki land, including the mountain, to punish the Maori for rebelling against British rule.

21Over the next 100 years, hunting and sports groups helped oversee how the land was used, but the Maori did not.

22Goldsmith told the Associated Press that, The Maori protest movement of the 1970s and 1980s led to increased recognition of the Maori language, culture, and rights in New Zealand's law.

23This has included billions of dollars to pay for the harm caused by breaking the Treaty of Waitangi.

24The mountain's legal rights are in place to support its health and well-being.

25The law will support traditional uses of the land and calls for conservation work to protect the native wildlife.

26The mountain will remain open to the public.

27New Zealand was the first country in the world to recognize landforms as people.

28In 2014, a law gave personhood to Te Urewera, a large forest on the North Island.

29Government ownership ended, and the Tuhoi tribe became its guardian.

30And in 2017, New Zealand recognized the Whanganui River as a human, as part of a settlement with the tribe connected to the river.

31All 123 lawmakers in parliament supported the new law for Taranaki Maunga.

32The unity of the vote was a change from recent disagreements in New Zealand about proposed changes to the Treaty of Waitangi itself.

33In November, about 40,000 people marched to parliament to protest a new law with proposed changes to the treaty.

34The protesters said the new law would take away Maori rights and harm the progress that has been made during the last 50 years.

35Most officials do not expect the bill with the proposed changes to become law.

36I'm Andrew Smith.