Data released by Superu shows how Bay of Plenty families perform against other New Zealand families on wellbeing indicators such as employment, housing, health and family connections.
While the differences between regions were relatively small for most of the wellbeing indicators, Bay of Plenty family members scored the highest in the country for easy access to services (94.3 per cent vs. 91.4 per cent nationally), and couples with young children were the most likely to share meals together (82.5 per cent vs. 78 per cent nationally) suggesting strong family connections.
On the downside, Bay of Plenty families were significantly less likely than people from most other regions to say that civil authorities are fair to everyone (56.6 per cent vs. 67.5 per cent nationally), and they were also much less likely to live in well-off areas (42.2 per cent lived in well-off areas vs. 54.1 per cent nationally) or to be employed (75.5 per cent vs. 80.4 per cent nationally).
"Every region has a slightly different profile - from family ethnicity, to family type to how they scored on our wellbeing indicators. The Bay of Plenty's family profile shows that, while they are fairly close to the national average, there are some strong regional differences, particularly around employment and how they view civil authorities," said Superu's knowledge director, Vasantha Krishnan.
In the Bay of Plenty, there were 73,842* families at last count.
This regional information is based on the data published in Superu's 2016 Families and Whānau Status Report, which looked at the make-up and wellbeing of New Zealand families and whānau. The report drew on multiple datasets such as the Census, the General Social Survey, the Household Economic Survey, the Disability Survey and the Youth Survey.
"This is the first time that a picture of how families are faring has been provided at a broad regional level. It is important to understand family wellbeing, not just individual wellbeing. There may be sub-regional variations but the data does not enable us to gain those insights at this point."
Superu is a government agency that focuses on what works to improve the lives of families, children and whānau.