By Māori, for Māori
This snippet comes from the submission of the Indigenous Genomics Institute. Ko wai mātou? The Indigenous Genomics Institute (IGI) (currently an LLC in the process of transferring to a charitable trust) began coalescing in 2020 in recognition that a gap existed in the RSI ecosystem in “for Māori, by Māori” guidance and leadership around genomics. We aim to be a resource and a voice for Māori communities, hapū, and iwi when it comes to educating whānau about genomics, empowering them to utilise genomics for their own kaupapa, and engaging with genomics researchers.
In the Ministers’ foreword, the green paper states that “we saw the best of our research system through the support it provided to the country during the COVID-19 pandemic.” While this might be true in general, systematic failures have been identified in the extent to which the government honoured Te Tiriti in its response to COVID (WAI2575, 2021). Despite the alarm being sounded by Māori leaders and service providers, this advice appeared to be ignored, leading to disproportionate death among Māori from COVID-19 (Megget, 2022). While this might serve as an extreme example, it shows the current reluctance of the crown to respect Māori knowledge structures and expertise e.g. a “seat at the table” is not enough, if decision makers are not prioritising Māori needs and aspirations.
A solution is to embed Māori as ‘decision makers’ in the newly realised RSI system, including Māori-specific funding streams administered by Māori, for Māori, to the benefit of Māori communities. It is also important to note that embedding Māori within organisational management is key. Some of us have experience working with organisations that have Māori-specific ‘oversight’ of research proposals (i.e. a kāhui, or reviewers of Vision Mātauranga), yet intermediate operational decisions can stymie the ability of Māori-relevant research to even reach these final reviews. These points (“by Māori, for Māori” and embedding Māori as decision makers) are important to consider across the questions asked throughout the green paper. For example, Māori should set national research priorities, Māori should decide what core functions are, and Māori should choose “performance metrics”. Māori should be present in management structures of all research organisations with real power to influence decisions (and not just as a ‘token’ gesture of diversity), there should be Māori researchers doing the work, Māori should explicitly benefit from research, and Māori should be the ones who assess the impact of this benefit. While this can (and should) be achieved within current institutions, Māori-led entities (e.g. whānau, hapū, iwi, the aforementioned regional hubs) should also be provided the funding and freedom to succeed under these terms as well.
References
Megget, K. (2022). How New Zealand’s covid-19 strategy failed Māori people. BMJ, 376(o180).
WAI2575. (2021). Haumaru: The COVID-19 priority report.
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