Latest audio from RNZ National

The rodeo season is underway and Lylah and Riley Wood, two home-schooled teenagers, are in an arena in Waikato practising barrel racing and breakaway roping, rodeo sports which have taken them to the… Audio

Wallingford Homestead in Central Hawke's Bay was once a bustling base for the local farming community. These days it's helping bridge the urban-rural divide and provide employment opportunities for… Audio

Thousands of perfectly shaped trees are harvested in the lead-up to the festive season at Andrew McAllister's Needle Fresh Christmas tree farm Swannanoa. In a next door paddock he's created a huge… Audio

The final round-up of the week's agricultural news for 2024. Audio

Now it's time for Country Life and this week, the team brings you stories about the rodeo world and an old rural homestead which has been turned into a sumptuous retreat. Audio

The end-of-year has arrived, and with it, the traditional suite of end-of-year reviews and thinkpieces. In this week's Focus on Politics, RNZ deputy political editor Craig McCulloch looks back on the… Audio

It's our final Checkpoint programme of the year, we've done 226 shows in 2024, that's close to 500 hours of radio and we've covered a lot of really remarkable stories from Aotearoa and around the… Audio

Asia correspondent Erin Hale spoke to Lisa Owen about a woman who's just returned home to the Philippines after spending 14 years on death row in Indonesia, China looking to make travel more accesible… Audio

You wouldn't buy your child a sibling as a present, so don't buy a companion animal without thinking very hard. That's the message from Mini Vadke from Mama Mini's rescue in Palmerston North, who… Audio

News from the business sector, including a market report Audio

Game one of the Rose Bowl series against Australia was abandoned and both teams will be hoping for a better weather forecast at the Basin Reserve for game two. Sports reporter Felicity Reid spoke to… Audio

In a surprise move, the sale of polytechnics will be on the table when the national institute of technology Te Pūkenga is disestablished. Tertiary Education Minister Penny Simmonds today announced the… Audio

Lavinia Mahit in Port Vila, the acting country director for Save The Children in Vanuatu spoke to Lisa Owen about the 3.7 magnitude earthquake in Vanuatu. Audio

Search and rescue including a specialist New Zealand team continue to scour rubble in Port Vila, with locals saying there were more than a dozen people were in the Billabong store that pancaked in… Audio

There's a little bit of a penguin parade going on in Oamaru. They've been wombling around the town and in out of shops in their best all year round tuxedos. A local tourism group is keeping an eye on… Audio

Hundreds of Manawatu residents at higher risk of developing bowel cancer have been told they won't get their regular check-up colonoscopies for at least six months. Te Whatu Ora MidCentral said it's… Audio

Being able to swim is often considered a life skill in a country like New Zealand - but tough economic times are forcing many families to pull their children out of swim lessons. A swim school in… Audio

Lawson will return home to New Zealand over the Christmas period before getting back to work in the simulator in the new year, testing on track in Bahrain in February and getting on the starting grid… Audio

The popularity of Electric Vehicles in New Zealand has moved into the slow lane. With the end of the clean car discount, introduction of road user charges or new ACC levies - things have kept coming… Audio

Someone once said a balanced diet is a cookie in each hand, they could have worked for Checkpoint. This week we've had our snouts in the good old fashioned biscuit sampler box that one of our… Audio