New Zealand 2018

New Zealand’s population in 2018 was estimated to be 4.88 million people, with a median age of 38.2 years old. The economy of New Zealand is largely driven by services, tourism and agriculture, with the country’s main exports being dairy products, meat and machinery. Tourism is also an important part of the economy, with the country welcoming over 3.8 million tourists in 2018. New Zealand has strong diplomatic relations with many countries around the world, particularly within Asia-Pacific and Oceania. The country is a member of the United Nations (UN), World Trade Organization (WTO) and Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) amongst others. According to extrareference, New Zealand is a constitutional monarchy led by Queen Elizabeth II since 1952 who appoints a Prime Minister to lead government affairs every three years.

Yearbook 2018

New Zealand. According to Countryaah.com, Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand, a country located in Polynesia. The government declared in April that more licenses for exploration for oil and gas at sea would not be granted. However, the companies that already had existing permits would not be affected. According to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, the intention was to protect both the climate and the existing industry.

In May, New Zealand decided to invest $ 880 million to eradicate Mycoplasma bovis disease among the country’s cattle. The money would be used to evict 126,000 cows from farms where the infection was located. Mycoplasma bovis can lead to pneumonia and joint inflammation in cows but does not pose a risk to humans.

• According to Abbreviationfinder: ZK is an three letter acronym for New Zealand.

In June, Jacinda Ardern had her first child. The news filled the media around the world with photos of the 37-year-old prime minister and her newborn daughter. When Ardern took office last year, she was New Zealand’s youngest head of government for 150 years. In connection with her daughter’s descent, she became one of the few leaders in modern times who gave birth to children during her reign. During her six-week maternity leave, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters of New Zealand First (NZF) took over the leadership.

During the summer, a new law was passed to give ten days of paid leave to those who have been subjected to domestic violence. The intention was to give victims of violence the opportunity to leave their partner and find a new home for themselves and their children. New Zealand has among the highest rates of domestic violence in the Western world, according to media reports. The law would come into force in April 2019.

In August, Prime Minister Ardern announced that disposable plastic bags in stores would be phased out next year as a step in reducing litter along New Zealand’s coasts. According to a UN report in June, 5 trillion plastic bags are used annually in the world, which is 10 million plastic bags per minute.

In September, Customs Minister Meka Whaitiri left her post after being accused of exposing a press secretary to bullying and physical violence. In the same month, the minister responsible for, among other things, radio and television broadcasts Clare Curran was forced to resign after it was revealed that she had used a private e-mail account for government work. According to the prime minister, the country’s coalition government would remain stable as Whaitiri and Curran remained in parliament.

Architecture in New Zealand

The Maoris developed a distinctive wooden architecture, carefully carved and decorated. Whare whakairo (timber frame house), pataka (warehouse) and pa (palisade village) are all original forms of Maori.

In the 19th century, western architecture was introduced, mainly British inspired. William Mason was New Zealand’s first leading architect. Like Mason, most architects were educated in the United Kingdom, and their architecture reflects the British Empire culture. Especially widespread were neo-Gothic wooden churches; some are big and beautiful and many still stand. The leading architects in neo-Gothic wood architecture were Frederick Thatcher and Benjamin Woolfield Mountfort as well as Thomas Turnbull.

The Maoris, for their part, developed two different building types during the same period, the whare runanga (the assembly house) and the whare karakia (the church), and competed to build the largest and most impressive examples. Western technology was used in the construction of these buildings, which are distinguished by their fine wood carvings and decorations. Subsequent Maori resistance movements formed the basis for some excellent buildings, such as the assembly houses in Ruatahuna (1870–88), Te Kuiti (1872), Te Teko (1882) and Waituhi (1883).

The division of New Zealand into provinces developed a regionalism in the architecture of Auckland, Wellington, Nelson, Christchurch and Dunedin. As in the church architecture, many of the most impressive worldly buildings were erected in wood. William Mason’s new government building in Auckland (1857), erected in a classic-inspired style. In Christchurch, Mountfort used New Gothic style in several public buildings as well as in churches. The gold rush in Dunedin in the 1860s provided the basis for the city’s new architecture. Worth mentioning is the Bank of New Zealand (1879–83) designed by William Barnett Armson. Robert Arthur Lawson also designed a number of notable buildings in Dunedin, but is also known for banking buildings in Oamaru, designed in a Greek-inspired style. William Henry Clayton designed the government buildings in Wellington (1876), which is one of the world’s largest wooden complexes. Towards the end of the 19th century, a number of buildings were erected in historicism (neo-Gothic, neo-Renaissance, Queen Anne, etc.); at the same time an influence from the Arts and Crafts Movement is felt.

Trends after 1900 are characterized by a search for local identity, in contrast to British models. The influence of the Arts and Crafts Movement at Samuel Hurst Seager and Basil Bramston Hooper. Public buildings in the New Baroque were characterized by British models, among others. at Dunedin Railway Station (1904–07). After World War I, increasing American influence is felt. The Californian bungalow became very popular in the 1920s, while a number of architects, among others. Cecil Walter Wood, preferred the American colonial style. The architecture of the 1920s and 1930s was still characterized by neo-Gothic and classicism. After the Napier earthquake in 1931, art deco-style buildings were erected, some with decorative motifs from Maori art. In Hastings, buildings were built in Spanish missionary style, art deco and classicist styles.

Modernism only struck after the Second World War. Worth mentioning is the Minimalist Experimental House (1950), Takapuna, Auckland. From the 1950s, a number of Maori architects formed an alternative to international modernism. Fortuna Chapel (1958–61), Wellington, designed by John Scott, notices a synthesis of gothic, modernism and elements of traditional Maori architecture. Characteristic of recent architecture is the awareness of regional identity and the development of a multicultural architecture that links modern technology with the country’s cultural heritage. New Zealand’s largest and most ambitious project in the 1990s is the construction of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington, designed by a group of architects in Auckland 1990.