Opening address: Council of Australasian Archives and Records Authorities (CAARA) Symposium, National Archives, Wellington

I would like to welcome you all here today – in particular the CAARA members visiting from Australia.

CAARA has been hosted by Archives New Zealand in Wellington once before, about 10 years ago – it is great you could make it over to us this time, and I hope that your meetings so far have been insightful and productive.

It is great that the New Zealand National Archives is hosting this symposium to coincide with your visit. My hope is that everyone here will get to absorb some new knowledge from the four speakers this afternoon.

Having the ability to learn from the experiences of others is one of most powerful things about archives and records.

One of the many treasures held in the Archives New Zealand’s Christchurch office is a map of Christchurch from 1850 – I am told it is often just referred to as the “Black Map”. This map shows the placements of the waterways that crossed the city at the time, many of which are now drained or buried.

Following the Canterbury Earthquakes in 2011, a copy of this map was provided to those responding to the earthquakes – along with a number of other maps from around the same time.

From these archives, people working on the earthquake response and recovery found a correlation between where watercourses once ran, and some areas of serious damage.

This link would have been much harder to find without these maps.

It is a wonderful reminder that records and archives are created and kept for a reason – they are not just kept for the sake of it.

Today you will be hearing more about earthquakes.

Denise Williams from our New Zealand National Archives will be speaking about the response to, and recovery from, last year’s 7.8 Kaikoura earthquake, which had a big impact on Archives New Zealand’s building and staff.

You will also get a chance to read more about the Black Map.

Marilyn Little uses this map as an example of the power of archives in her foreword to the Archives 2057 long-term strategy, which will be launched later this afternoon.

This strategy will guide the work of the New Zealand National Archives in the coming decades, and inform decision-making in a fast-changing, and increasingly digital, operating environment.

I suspect that many of you here made submissions on the discussion document which was released late last year. I know that this feedback was greatly appreciated and many suggestions and ideas have been incorporated in the final strategy.

I am told that copies will be available to take with you as you leave here today.

Two of our Australian guests will also be speaking today:

• Justine Heazlewood will be speaking about the volunteer programme which has been set up at Victoria’s Public Record Office; and
• Geoff Hinchcliffe will be speaking about the New South Wales State Archives and Records Office’s experience with the shift from paper records to digital government.

The four topics being discussed by today are diverse, reflecting that there are many facets to the world of records and information management. At the same time – they can also be linked by a single theme – ‘archives in a changing world’.

For three of the speakers today, the key driver for change is the digital shift.

There are some really big issues to tackle in this area. This includes working out how to:

• deal with the huge amount of digital information being produced each year;
• adapt to ever-changing digital technologies; and
• live up to the public’s growing expectations from that information should be readily available online.

Of course the digital shift is not the only driver for change in your field. Today will also cover the physical changes to our world that we need to respond to – in this case, the literal shifting of tectonic plates.

There are a lot of challenges that you face in the coming decades – the discussions here today prove that you are ready to tackle them head on.

I wish you well with your deliberations.

Thank you.