Difference between a national and forest park?

You can hunt in National Parks - not sure this helps at all with explaining the difference though sorry. National parks are protected to a much greater extent than a forest park - you would be able to find the legal difference (and lengthy descriptions no doubt!) on the DOC website.

It is possible to go hunting in National Park, a lot of people do. The main difference is that National Parks have higher scenic and ecological value than forest parks. So they have greater protections under the law. National parks also typically have better quality facilities and see more trampers.

no dogs or open fires allowed in national parks, the national parks have higher protection from potential commercial exploitation, with management plans in place for that purpose.commercial recreation is more controlled, even aspects like where aircraft can fly and land can be controlled... more money gets spent in national part preserving them and the native wildlife in them... you're far more likely to be able to mine or grow forest plantations in a forest park. highly unlikely n a national park, usually not done but one Govt wanted to mine in htem. luckily public protest stopped that. you usually cant harvest the forests in national parks now, although they have harvested windfall trees recently. and thats a contentious ecological issue https://www.doc.govt.nz/about-us/our-policies-and-plans/statutory-plans/statutory-plan-publications/national-park-management/general-policy-for-national-parks/

It's really about the reasons for and level of protection in the area. A lot of that also comes down to legislation and history, though. Historically, National Parks were created by Lands and Survey on the lands it managed. Forest Parks were created by the Forest Service on the lands it managed, and in the latter case apparently that was some kind of compromise it made. Some people were suggesting parts of its land should be National Parks, but the bureaucracy wasn't keen to place so many limitations on the use of the land, so it came up with another designation. (I can't recall where I read that, though, and welcome corrections.) Those two departments were almost acting in competition with each other at one point. Since the Department of Conservation was created in 1987, it manages all of the land, but with various different classifications. National Parks remain National Parks under the National Parks Act. Forest Parks still keep their original names as Forest Parks, but in law they're now managed under the Conservation Act and are effectively equivalent to Conservation Parks. There's also a whole heap of Stewardship Land under DOC's management, which was meant to be assessed and classified since DOC was formed in the late 1980s but often never has been. Lately there's been a push for it, though, and we've been getting newly gazetted Conservation Parks here and there. Occasionally if there's been enough justification argued, we might get a new National Park or have land added to an existing National Park.

Just following on, exactly why an area has been designated as a certain kind of park is a whole other thing. Sometimes it involves politics. But.... Here's the legislative reference in the NPA to the principles of a National Park: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1980/0066/latest/whole.html#DLM37794 Here's the legislative reference to the principles of a Conservation Park (also inclusive of Forest Parks): http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1987/0065/latest/whole.html#DLM104683 Scroll down from the second one and the Conservation Act also defines principles for Wilderness Areas, Ecological Areas, Sanctuary Areas, Watercourse Areas, Amenity Areas, Wildlife Management Areas. Then there are Marginal Strips: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1987/0065/latest/whole.html#DLM104697 ...and Stewardship Land is basically what's left over: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1987/0065/latest/whole.html#DLM104955 But wait, there's more! There are also more than a thousand reserves scattered around, which are managed under the Reserves Act. Often they're managed by DOC but sometimes they might be managed by a separate local government authority. Most of these are smaller than Conservation Parks and National Parks, but they're set aside for more specific purposes. eg. Kapiti Island is managed as a Nature Reserve, and the rules for a Nature Reserve make it easy for DOC to require permit-only access, which is important for a lot of the pest-free offshore island habitats. Here's the starting point for the definitions in the Reserves Act: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1977/0066/52.0/whole.html#DLM444605 Scroll down from there and it'll describe Recreation Reserves, Historic Reserves, Scenic Reserves, Nature Reserves, Scientific Reserves, Government Purpose Reserves and Local Purpose Reserves. Each of them has different priorities and different ways they they're required to be managed, and different rules for things like public access and how it can be allowed and disallowed. Some of the reserve types are fairly vague, and again exactly why certain areas were declared as one type of reserve and not another can sometimes come down to politics at the time it happened at least as much as merit.

David Barnes has written a series of short articles for the FMC website wilderlife.nz about the differences between the differing classifications of conservation areas. https://wilderlife.nz/author/david-barnes/