New records standards for New Zealand.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: UP FRONT

Archives New Zealand Minister Judith Tizard has introduced two new recordkeeping standards for local and federal government agencies: the Create and Maintain Recordkeeping Standard and the Electronic Recordkeeping Metadata Standard.

"Information management is an essential and important legacy," said Tizard. "Well-kept information lets us bring our past into the future and ensures government is transparent and accountable."

Tizard said New Zealand's two new standards provide a firm basis for achieving this. For example, the Create and Maintain Standard--which is now mandatory for government and local government organizations--identifies the key requirements for successful information management and establishes minimum requirements for an organization's information to remain usable, reliable, and available.

The also-mandatory Electronic Recordkeeping Metadata Standard encourages a systematic approach to managing information in business systems. This ensures information has meaning, can be found when needed, can be trusted, and can be transferred safely between systems.

"We will be able to answer the questions as to who created a record, when, and for what purpose and, importantly, whether it has been...