A major focus of NZFT research and activities was supporting and working with communities and individuals to imagine, and then to prepare for possible futures for life in New Zealand. Some of the projects were exclusively under the umbrella of the New Zealand Futures Trust and some were in partnership with other bodies.
On this page you can find:
"Our Country: Our Choices; Prospects for 2020 (He tumanako mo te tau rua mano rua tekau)" in which eleven New Zealanders in 1997 wrote about their views of possible futures for the 2020s. Topics covered include community ethics, conservation, identity, education, economy, local government and the place of New Zealand in the world community.
Scripts of five of the six scenarios prepared for the Radio New Zealand Te Papa Debates broadcast in late 1999 as a prelude to millennium celebrations. Entitled "Being There in 2021 - What will it be like?", the debates covered the topics: Culture and Identity, Education, Rural New Zealand, Urban New Zealand, The Economy and Health.
In 2001 NZ Post ran a marketing campaign entitled "The road ahead…." Part of this campaign was a competition in which New Zealanders were invited to submit their vision for the future of their country, in the form of prose of 50 words or less, or a drawing. The NZFT analysed about 7800 of the responses and produced a report in 2002 entitled "Visions for the Future - What New Zealanders Want". The analysis identified 16 themes and found that responses differed, depending on age, region and gender.