Co-designing a research programme for impact: lessons learned from practice by Aotearoa New Zealand’s Biological Heritage National Science Challenge Ngā Koiora Tuku Iho

Doing co-design and co-production is challenging, resource intensive, and outcomes do not always translate into action. Evaluations of processes are needed to identify what enables and constrains ‘co’ efforts. This paper draws on the findings of an evaluation of a co-design process undertaken by Aotearoa New Zealand’s Biological Heritage National Science Challenge, Ngā Koiora Tuku Iho (BHNSC) in 2019. The independent evaluation, commissioned by the BHNSC, draws on process observations and 25 semi-structured interviews with BHNSC leaders and process participants. In this paper, we present key insights from the evaluation through the application of co-production quality assessment principles and a knowledge governance conceptual framework. Our analysis identifies the BHNSC’s values as a critical factor in its journey to conduct a process that would foster collaboration between mātauranga Māori and Western science knowledge systems and deliver impact-focused biodiversity and biosecurity research. We propose an additional principle for assessing the quality of co-production processes: values-inspired