About
In May 2026, the Ministry for Regulation — led by chief executive Greer Moss — published “The State of New Zealand's Regulatory Systems” (ISBN 978-1-991372-14-7), the first comprehensive map of New Zealand's entire regulatory landscape. Using machine learning and AI to analyse legislation, annual reports, and workforce data, they identified at least 282 separate organisations involved in regulation. Our platform directory covers 326 regulatory bodies in total, including additional bodies identified from other official NZ government sources.
This report was presented by Minister for Regulation David Seymour at a public event attended by chief executives and public service leaders. The key finding: New Zealand's regulatory environment has grown for 25 years without meaningful reform, responsibilities are fragmented across dozens of bodies, and citizens often have to navigate multiple regulators just to do simple things.
regulation.nz is a public-interest directory built on that report. Our goal: make it easy for any New Zealander to find the right regulator, understand what triggers contact, and get the correct phone number, email address, and application portal without having to search through dozens of government websites.
Contact details were individually verified from each regulator's official govt.nz or own-domain contact page in May 2026. We note explicitly where details could not be confirmed. We commit to quarterly re-verification.
96 Departments & Crown entities (36%)
50 departments, 36 crown entities, 3 departmental agencies, 4 non-public service & other, 2 SOEs, 1 statutory corporation, 1 statutory monopoly
79 Local government entities (30%)
61 territorial authorities, 11 regional councils, 5 unitary authorities, 2 special purpose councils
60 Statutory bodies, committees & tribunals (22%)
56 statutory bodies, 4 independent tribunals
32 Charities & companies incl. crown-owned (12%)
29 incorporated societies or companies
The report's most memorable illustration: dog control involves 5 regulators (Internal Affairs, Primary Industries, Health, Conservation, Justice) and 11 Acts of Parliament. Day-to-day enforcement is split between central and local government and delegated to rangers, authorised officers, police, the SPCA, DOC staff, and public health — depending on location and what the dogs are doing.
As Seymour noted: “This is just dogs. We picked a relatively simple example. You replicate this across 267 regulators and a whole lot of activities including those much more complex than owning a dog and you start to see the problem.”
Note: The May 2026 report identifies 267 organisations — the number mentioned in the speech reflects the preliminary count used at time of presentation. The final report uses 267.
282 organisations are explicitly identified in the Ministry for Regulation's May 2026 report (ISBN 978-1-991372-14-7, licensed CC BY 4.0). Our directory includes 326 regulatory bodies total — the additional entries were sourced from other official NZ government publications and legislation. Contact details were sourced from individual regulator websites and govt.nz. This site is not affiliated with the New Zealand government — it is an independent public-interest reference built to make the report's findings accessible.
If you spot an error or outdated contact detail, please get in touch.