This is the third in Buddle Findlay's series of articles about the new planning and environment system.

The Planning Act and Natural Environment Act (the Acts) received Royal Assent and came into force on 30 September 2026, meaning New Zealand's environment and planning legal framework has entered a period of significant change.  As we navigate this shift to the new resource management system, it is useful to step back and look at how the Acts frame their purposes, goals, principles and bottom lines.

Purpose

In contrast to the broader, all-encompassing 'sustainable management' purpose in the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA), both Acts seek to provide concise, descriptive purpose statements.

The Planning Act's purpose is to provide for the enjoyment of land by establishing a framework for planning and regulating the use and development of land.

The Natural Environment Act's purpose is to establish a framework for the use, protection, and enhancement of the natural environment.

Given the purpose statements are relatively narrow in scope, substantial reliance will be placed on the goals set out in each Act to shape outcomes under the new system.

Goals

Goals are an important new feature in the Acts (there is no direct equivalent in the RMA).  The goals in each Act are intended to give effect to the directive purpose statements set out above.

The Planning Act's goals focus on:

  • Ensuring land use does not unreasonably affect others

  • Supporting and enabling economic growth and the development of land

  • Creating well-functioning urban and rural areas

  • Enabling competitive urban land markets by making land available to create abundant development opportunities for residential and business use

  • Enabling infrastructure to be provided to meet and respond to current and future demand

  • Maintaining public access to and along the coastal marine area, lakes, and rivers

  • Protecting the identified values and characteristics of the following from inappropriate development:

    • areas of high natural character within the coastal environment, wetlands, and lakes and rivers and their margins

    • outstanding natural features and landscapes

    • significant historic heritage.

The Natural Environment Act's goals focus on:

  • Enabling the use and development of natural resources, including for the production of food and fibre (including aquaculture)

  • Safeguarding the life-supporting capacity of air, water, soil, and ecosystems

  • Protecting human health from harm caused by the discharge of contaminants

  • Supporting and enabling the enhancement of the natural environment

  • Protecting significant indigenous biodiversity.

Both Acts include goals on safeguarding against natural hazard risks and providing for Māori interests.

The Acts make clear that not all goals need to be achieved in all places at all times, and that no hierarchy exists among the goals.  As outlined in our second article, prioritisation between the goals is instead left to National Policy Direction, which should direct how goals are to be achieved and identify and resolve conflicts between them.  National Policy Direction is a fundamental element of shaping the new system and is intended to provide a consistent and integrated framework for decision-making.

Procedural principles

Our first article introduced the additional procedural principles that have been inserted into the RMA, to apply during the transitional period.  These principles supplement those set out in section 18A of the RMA.

Section 16 of both the Planning Act and the Natural Environment Act set out the procedural principles that apply to any person exercising or performing a function, power, or duty under the Acts.

These principles are substantively identical in the two Acts, and include the following:

  • All documents are to be succinct and use plain language

  • Processes are to be timely, efficient, consistent, and cost-effective

  • Persons must act proportionately to the scale and significance of the matter to which the function, power or duty relates

  • There must be sufficient and necessary information to understand the implications of a decision

  • Decision-makers must act in a pragmatic way to support practical solutions

  • Any condition must, on an individual basis, be no more onerous than necessary to address the specified reason

  • Appropriate technology is to be used

  • Unnecessary repetition in key instruments is to be avoided.

As discussed in our first article, the section 16 procedural principles do not fully align with the transitional procedural principles introduced through the new section 18B of the RMA.  This is an important factor for decision makers to consider when exercising functions during the transitional period and once the Acts are in full force.

Bottom lines / environmental limits

The environmental limits in the Natural Environment Act broadly represent the bottom lines under the RMA system.  At a high level, the framework will provide for:

  • Human health limits, set by the Minister through national standards

  • Ecosystem health limits, set at a regional level, in natural environment plans.

The Natural Environment Act requires reasonable steps be taken to avoid breaching environmental limits.  Where a breach occurs, a series of prescribed steps must be followed, including the implementation of action plans.  National standards are generally intended to enable resource use only within environmental limits.  However, the Act allows national standards to authorise activities that breach, or are likely to breach, a limit if the Minister is satisfied there is a net public benefit in authorising the activity, having considered the harm or potential harm, the wider implications, and the opportunity costs.

Please contact a member of our team if you would like to discuss the potential implications of the new legislation for you.