Event Sanctioning

The Waka Ama NZ (WANZ) Event Sanctioning process exists to ensure waka ama events, organisers, participants, and the sport itself remains safe and protected and that a duty of care is upheld within the sport. WANZ Event Sanctioning is only available to WANZ member clubs and regions.

To meet the Waka Ama NZ sanctioning requirements, you must pay the associated sanctioning fee and submit the following sanctioning documents no later than 30 days of approval of your requested event date.

Operations & Safety Management Plan
Event Sanctioning Agreement

Pānui, event waivers, and entry set up information must also be provided using the available templates (see attachments)

WANZ Event Approval is available for non waka ama entities. The same sanctioning process must be followed, however please use the Event Approval Agreement.

Fees and benefits for Waka Ama NZ sanctioned and approved events:

Fees & Benefits

For more information on Event Management, check out our Kete Karapu:

Event Management

Event Sanctioning Process

1. Plan your Event

Start planning your event. Planning your event is about deciding the ‘what, where, when, how, who’ for your event.

2. Request a Date

To start the sanctioning process, email [email protected] to request a date in the WANZ race calendar.

3. Sanctioning Documents

You need to complete the sanctioning documents within 30 days of your date request being confirmed.

4. Sanctioning Fee

WANZ will send you a sanctioning fee invoice. You need to pay your sanctioning fee within 30 days of your date request being confirmed.

5. Review & Confirmation

WANZ will review the sanctioning documents and confirm sanctioning of your event if all requirements are met.

6. Event Pānui & Entry Set Up

You will need to provide an event pānui for the website and entry set up information for the WANZ online entry system.

Now that your event is sanctioned, you have paid your sanctioning fee, information is online, and entries are open, continue with your event preparation and management. If you have any further information or updates, send these through to [email protected]

Event Management

Continue with your event preparation. On the event day, implement your event plan and Operations & Safety Management plan.

Post Event Report

Complete the WANZ Post Event Report within 14 days of your event. The link for the report is provided in your sanctioning letter.

Results & Photos

Send results, photos, links to social media from your event to [email protected] to be posted online.

Importance of Sanctioning

As the sport grows and as more and more events get added to the calendar it is important that we provide a process for nationally sanctioned events:

Safety of participants
Minimum Safety standard
Legal protection for organisers
Protection for the sport
One insurance policy for sanctioned events (saves costs for all event organisers)
Website publication of events
Capture of real participant numbers
Better planning and structure of event calendar
Minimum standard of delivery

Protecting Waka Ama

As well as ensuring that event organisers are protected, we have a duty of care that the sport is protected and its members are safe at all times. As a water sport, waka ama is open to risks that require us to ensure we take adequate precautions to inform, protect and enable participants as well as event organisers. For this reason we have developed some standard safety protocols.

The following must be used when planning and running your event:

Operations & Safety Management Plan (required sanctioning document)
Support Boat Calculator: a calculation tool for the minimum number of safety boats required at events
Sanctioning Safety Requirements
Race/Safety Briefing Checklist
Safety Check Forms
Incident Report Form

Support Boat Calculator

Public Liability Insurance

A public liability certificate will be provided to all Waka Ama NZ sanctioned events.

In New Zealand the availability of no fault insurance cover through ACC and the lack of a right to sue for personal injury must not be allowed to lead to complacency about the safety of others. A Public and Products Liability policy can provide your club, community group or organisation with an indemnity against all sums which you become legally liable to pay (by way of compensation) for damage to the public resulting from an occurrence which arises from your activities. A legal liability can arise from your negligence, or the negligence of your members, including voluntary workers engaged on behalf of the club, who are working in a recognised role for the club or group.

To put this simply if you do something, or fail to do something, then where you are negligent and someone’s property is damaged as a result of this negligent act, the policy will defend you and pay compensation if you are legally liable subject to the specific terms and conditions of the policy.

The above is a very brief explanation of Public Liability insurance, it is important that all event organisers have appropriate levels of insurance to cover their liability. In many cases now City Councils are requiring that event organisers produce a Public Liability Certificate before permission will be given to use a public space or waterway for an event.