New book: New Zealand’s Rivers

Release in November 2016

From cover: New Zealand’s Rivers: An environmental history explores the relationship between New Zealanders and our rivers, explaining how we have arrived at a crisis point, where fresh water has become our most contested resource and many rivers are too polluted to swim in.

Environmental historian Catherine Knight reveals that the tension between exploitation and enjoyment of rivers is not new. Rivers were treasured by Māori as food baskets and revered as the dwelling places of supernatural creatures. But following European settlement, they became drains for mining, industrial waste and sewage, and harnessed to generate power and to irrigate farmland. Over time, the dominant utilitarian view of rivers has been increasingly questioned by those who value rivers for fishing and canoeing as well as for ecological, spiritual and cultural reasons. Today, the sustainable use of rivers is the subject of hotly contested debate.

Thoroughly researched and…