Tag Archives: BBC News

NZ Government Pledges Millions to save the Kiwi

NZ Government Pledges Millions to save the Kiwi

Following warnings that New Zealand’s national bird could become extinct, the government has set aside NZ$11.2m ($8.3m; £5.3m) to stop the constant decline of kiwi numbers. “The aim of the investment is to turn the…

New Zealand to Rural Iceland – Extreme Commute

New Zealand to Rural Iceland – Extreme Commute

Every year, several dozen butchers make a lengthy commute – from provincial New Zealand to rural Iceland – for just two months’ work. Shawn Parkinson (pictured, far left), one of the butchers, explains that the…

New Zealand Wins Seat on UN Security Council

New Zealand Wins Seat on UN Security Council

New Zealand has won a seat on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The 15-member council has five permanent members – the US, UK, France, Russia and China – and 10 non-permanent seats, filled…

Mark Burry Maintains Epic Work on the Sagrada Família

Mark Burry Maintains Epic Work on the Sagrada Família

Executive architect of the Sagrada Família New Zealander Mark Burry has been able to complete Gaudí’s designs by devising parametric computer modelling techniques, adapted from the aerospace industry. Burry has even sped up the…

Wales Coach Warren Gatland Receives OBE

Wales Coach Warren Gatland Receives OBE

Head coach of the Wales rugby team, New Zealander Warren Gatland has received an OBE from the Duke of Cambridge for his services to rugby at an investiture ceremony in Windsor Castle. Gatland said he…

Growing up in NZ Public, Broods Now Hitting the Big Time

Growing up in NZ Public, Broods Now Hitting the Big Time

Broods only started writing music together last year, but the Nelson brother-sister duo, Caleb and Georgia Nott, aged 21 and 19, are being tipped as New Zealand’s next big musical exports. They speak to…

On the Hunt for a Prized Mollusc

On the Hunt for a Prized Mollusc

In Otago, a group of recreational fishermen are about to go on their regular autumn hunt for shellfish, but it is not just any mollusc that they’re after. They are looking for a humble…

NZ Prepares to Wear ‘Big Boy Pants’

NZ Prepares to Wear ‘Big Boy Pants’

British BBC readers overwhelmingly support New Zealand ditching the last official remnant of its colonial past. A referendum will be held at this year’s election on whether to change the flag, which features the…

Repatriation of Lost Ancestral Remains

Repatriation of Lost Ancestral Remains

A tattooed preserved Maori head, or toi moko, and skeletal remains, koiwi tangata, discovered in the anatomy department at the University of Birmingham, are being returned to New Zealand. University staff said the ancestral items…

Our Islands Formally and Bilingually Named

Our Islands Formally and Bilingually Named

15 October 2013 – New Zealand has formally adopted names in English and Maori for the North Island and the South Island; the English already in use but which had not been officially designated. In…

He Ain’t Ugly, He’s Our Parrot

He Ain’t Ugly, He’s Our Parrot

An international public vote has given the beloved and endangered New Zealand parrot, the kakapo, the unwanted title of the world’s second most ugly animal. The ugliest, according to the online campaign by the…

New Zealander Rescued After Being Trapped by Crocodile

New Zealander Rescued After Being Trapped by Crocodile

A New Zealand kayaker spent two weeks stranded on a small island off the coast of Western Australia after a menacing crocodile refused to let him leave. Each time the man tried to kayak away…

Sir Keith’s Locomotive Rededicated in Worcestershire

Sir Keith’s Locomotive Rededicated in Worcestershire

A locomotive renovated after 20 years in a scrapyard has been rededicated to the Battle of Britain legend New Zealander Keith Park it was first named after in 1947. Sir Keith commanded RAF squadrons…

New Zealand Landscape Plays Active Role in Films

New Zealand Landscape Plays Active Role in Films

“If a country could be eligible for a best actor award, New Zealand could be in the running for every gong going,” writes Megan Lane. In the piece for BBC News Magazine, Lane explores…

New Zealand’s First Same-Sex Marriages Occur Across the Country

New Zealand’s First Same-Sex Marriages Occur Across the Country

Just hours after same-sex marriage laws came into force, New Zealand’s first gay marriages began taking place across the country. 31 couples plan on tying the knot today, but the number is likely to…

Cooking Up Raspberry Pi with the Internet of Things

Cooking Up Raspberry Pi with the Internet of Things

New Zealand developer Nathan Broadbent was inspired to hack into his microwave after reading a post on Reddit about using matrix barcodes to instruct microwave ovens. Broadbent then cooked a raspberry pie using the…

New Zealand’s Answer to The Killing

New Zealand’s Answer to The Killing

Jane Campion’s television series Top of the Lake, “set in the staggeringly beautiful landscape of the South Island”, has been called New Zealand’s answer to The Killing. Obstreperous and tunnel-visioned, detective Robin Griffin has…

Sending the Right Message About Age

Sending the Right Message About Age

“Karen Walker Eyewear is worn by the style conscious and coveted by a youthful market, yet their latest campaign showcases women aged between 80 and 93 from Cohen’s

Soprano to Open Coronation Celebrations

Soprano to Open Coronation Celebrations

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa will perform the British national anthem “God Save the Queen” in the gardens of Buckingham Palace in July to mark the 60th anniversary of the Queen’s coronation. Te…

Cannes Award for Campion

Cannes Award for Campion

Director of award-winning film The Piano, Wellington-born Jane Campion, 58, will be presented with the Carrosse d’Or from the Society of Film Directors at the Cannes Film Festival in May. Campion will be…

Scrimp No More

Scrimp No More

New Zealand’s favourite breakfast spread, Marmite has returned to supermarket shelves for the first time in over a year, after shortages caused by the Christchurch earthquake. “You’ve rationed, you’ve scraped, you’ve survived marmageddon – and…

Keeping Friends and Influencing Nations

Keeping Friends and Influencing Nations

Sir Don McKinnon appeared on a BBC ‘Daily Politics’ segment arguing that the Commonwealth is a “pretty good investment” for Britain but it has not “always used it best”. The New Zealander was the…

Busting into Song

Busting into Song

She’s only 26, but New Zealander Gin Wigmore has already acted alongside Daniel Craig and recorded in Frank Sinatra’s studio. You may already have heard the first single, a bawdy barrelhouse stomp called Man…

Cycling Holidays Transformed

Cycling Holidays Transformed

By the end of 2012, 10 of the 20 tracks making up the 2340km New Zealand Cycle Trail were open to riders, with the remainder scheduled for completion by the end of 2013. Veteran…

Return To Middle Earth

Return To Middle Earth

“In New Zealand, there is a peculiar clarity to the sunlight,” Lonely Plant traveller Alex Von Tunzelmann writes for the BBC. “Highlights blaze; shadows are cast very, very dark. The effect makes the grass…

Fun-Loving MP Lit Our Screens

Fun-Loving MP Lit Our Screens

As New Zealanders gathered around their black and white sets to experience the miracle of television for the first time the face many of them will have seen staring back at them was that…

New Contemporary Novel

New Contemporary Novel

Award-winning New Zealand novelist C.K. Stead, 80, was a guest on BBC series The Forum talking about his latest novel, Risk, which tells the story of a lawyer who turns to banking…

Back to His Roots Playing Cop

Back to His Roots Playing Cop

Sam Neill plays Belfast police chief C.I. Campbell in new BBC gangster drama, Peaky Blinders, which is currently shooting in Birmingham, Leeds and Liverpool. While Neill is one of the more well-known New Zealand…

Linking Bilingual Minds

Linking Bilingual Minds

Four teachers from New Zealand are spending two weeks in Wales, visiting schools in Cardiff, Swansea, Llandudno and Wrexham, to learn more about bilingual education. The teachers, Piata Allen (left), Nichola McCall (right), Stacey…

Other Side of Paradise

Other Side of Paradise

“New Zealand, a country that routinely tops international lifestyle indexes, may not be the first place you would associate with gang culture – but violent gangs have deep roots in society,” Rebecca Kesby writes…

Taia o Moko

Taia o Moko

Dr Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, author of Mau Moko: The World of Maori Tattoo and essayist and commentator on Maori and feminist issues in New Zealand, memorialized the Maori Queens’s death by taking a traditional facial tattoo….

Olympians Visit UK Marae

Olympians Visit UK Marae

The New Zealand Olympic team paid a visit to the Hinemihi marae in Surrey, England. Hinemihi was brought to Surrey by Lord Onslow, the former Governor of New Zealand, as a souvenir of his…

Illegal Downloads Halved

Illegal Downloads Halved

Internet piracy rates in New Zealand have halved since the introduction of the controversial “three strikes” rule, the Recording Industry Association of New Zealand (Rianz) says. The rule allows fines of up to $15,000…

Upritchard Pose at V&A

Upritchard Pose at V&A

A work by New Zealand artist Francis Upritchard is part of the Britain Creates 2012: Fashion + Art Collision exhibition on at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum through 29 July. “An old…

Wellington Hosts Hobbit

Wellington Hosts Hobbit

The world premiere of Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey will take place at Wellington’s Embassy Theatre on 28 November two weeks ahead of the film’s release on 14 December. Based…

Trojan War Maori Style

Trojan War Maori Style

The director of New Zealand’s version of Troilus and Cressida Rachel House explains how she put Maori culture at the heart of Shakespeare’s Trojan tragedy. Thirty-seven theatre companies from around the world are presenting…

Runway Sales

Runway Sales

Owners of Glasgow’s Prestwick Airport, New Zealand-based infrastructure investment company Infratil, are putting the property up for sale. Infratil has said it is also looking for a buyer for its British airport, Manston in…

Trench Living Makes Big

Trench Living Makes Big

A ‘supergiant’ crustacean measuring 34cm has been found 7km deep in the Kermadec Trench north off the coast of New Zealand. Seven specimens, of which usually measure between 2-3cm, were caught in a trap…

Ribboned Rakaia From Space

Ribboned Rakaia From Space

An image of the braided Rakaia River has won an online vote through Facebook for best satellite image of 2011. The image was captured by American commercial satellite imaging firm DigitalGlobe. The river, shown…

Recapturing the Glory Days

Recapturing the Glory Days

Papakura-born fly-half Stephen Donald, 27, who signed a two-year deal with Premiership club Bath in August, says he wants to help the team recapture their “glory days”. “They’re very ambitious. I’d love to contribute…

Rats Not Such Pests After All

Rats Not Such Pests After All

Invasive rats are compensating for the loss of native pollinators in New Zealand, scientists report in a paper published in a Royal Society journal. “New Zealand offers a really interesting and rare opportunity to…

Return to the Icy Wild

Return to the Icy Wild

Happy Feet, the “lost” emperor penguin which washed up on the Kapiti Coast, has been returned to the ocean; a BBC article examines how he and other animals are released back into the wild….

Synthetic Highs Banned

Synthetic Highs Banned

A 12-month ban of 43 synthetic cannabis products has come into effect in New Zealand. Some retailers believe that other legal highs will continue to flood a very popular, and lucrative, market. Manager of…

Out of Africa

Out of Africa

New Zealander Stephen Jennings, industrialist, investment banker and CEO of Moscow-based Renaissance Group, discusses the issues surrounding wealth creation in Russia, and doing business in Africa, on BBC Hardtalk. Jennings contends that Africa is…

Trinity Opportunities

Trinity Opportunities

University of Canterbury student Bree Loverich is one of 42 from Christchurch studying free at Oxford University for its eight-week Trinity term, after the British university offered places to those affected by February’s earthquake….

HardTalk With John Key

HardTalk With John Key

BBC’s Stephen Sackur tackles PM John Key in London in a 25 minute interview for HardTalk (Part 1, Part 2). Positioning New Zealand as “very small” and “too small”, Sackur…

Southee Signs with Essex

Southee Signs with Essex

Northern Districts bowler Tim Southee has signed with Essex for this year’s Twenty2 campaign, which begins in June. Whangarei-born Southee has played 19 Twenty2 internationals for his country, taking 22 wickets with best figures…

Return of the Yeti Hand

Return of the Yeti Hand

Adventurer and Air New Zealand pilot Mike Allsop is in Nepal to return a replica of what some believe is the hand of a yeti to a remote monastery in the Everest region. Allsop…

Remembered Always

Remembered Always

The Prince of Wales has joined a congregation of some 19 — mainly made up of London-based New Zealanders — at a Westminster Abbey memorial service for the victims of February’s Christchurch earthquake. At…

Critical darlings most promising

Critical darlings most promising

Art-pop quintet The Naked and Famous has been named as this year’s “most promising new act” by NME; post-award ceremony the band talks to Mark Savage of BBC 6 about their recent “good fortunes”….

Ecosystem Fragility

Ecosystem Fragility

University of Canterbury researchers say they have linked the modern-day decline of a common forest shrub with the local extinction of two pollinating birds — the bellbird and stitchbird — over a century ago….

Dancing Success

Dancing Success

A New Zealand dancer took out one of the top accolades in the dancing world at this year’s Critic’s Circle National Dance Awards. Following in the success of her dance company, Rambert Dance, Pieter…

Scenic Rail Journeys

Scenic Rail Journeys

Travelling by train from Wellington to London, BBC journalist Robert Greenall writes that “there are still plenty of good reasons to go by train.” “The joy of ‘slow travel’ is that you see how…

Taking on the World

Taking on the World

New Zealand quintet  The Naked and Famous have already topped local singles and album charts and now they want to repeat their success globally. They’re off to a blistering start after being named in…

New Zealand’s X-Files

New Zealand’s X-Files

New Zealand’s military has released hundreds of files, dating from 1954 to 29, detailing claims of sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs), including New Zealand’s most famous UFO sighting over Kaikoura in 1978. The…

Nation in Mourning

Nation in Mourning

PM John Key declared that New Zealand was a “nation in mourning” after the deaths of 29 miners in explosions in the Pike River coal mine. “New Zealand is a country where we are…