This legislation regulates Māori customary fishing in the North Island and Chatham Islands. Regulations effective from 1 February 1999.
Under the 1992 Deed of Settlement the Crown agreed, among other things, to introduce legislation empowering the making of regulations recognising and providing for customary food gathering and the special relationship between the tangata whenua and places of importance for customary food gathering (including tauranga ika and mahinga mātaitai), to the extent that such food gathering is not commercial in any way nor involves commercial gain or trade.