Environment Canterbury API Terms of Use
1) About our APIs and API Platform
a) Our APIs allow data to be sent to and from us in a prescribed format. Our Platform includes APIs which allow access to publicly available information (Public APIs) and APIs which allow authorised users to provide data to us and download the same, subject to a range of requirements specified in these Terms (Restricted APIs).
b) The Platform is designed to allow you to innovate and integrate your applications, products and services with us.
2) Application of these Terms of Use
a) Your use of and access to the Platform is governed by these Terms. By using and/or accessing the Platform you confirm that you accept these Terms and agree to comply with them.
b) If you do not accept these Terms, you are not authorised to access or use our Platform, any you must immediately stop doing so.
c) We may vary these Terms from time to time. We will provide notice of the change by uploading the updated Terms on our Platform and, if you have an account with us, emailing the Terms to you. After we provide that notice you will be deemed to have accepted those updated Terms if you continue to use the Platform.
d) If you are using the Platform on behalf of an organisation or in your capacity as an employee or contractor of an organisation:
i) you represent and warrant that you have the authority to bind that organisation to these Terms; and
ii) references in these Terms to 'you' are references to you as an individual and to that organisation.
e) Each organisation that is party to these Terms:
i) will ensure that all of its employees, contractors and agents are aware of, and comply with these Terms; and
ii) will be liable for all acts and omissions of any person to whom it allows access to the Platform (including its employees, contractors and agents) in respect of these Terms and the Platform.
3) User accounts
a) To access and use the APIs, you will need to create a user account on our Platform. This allows us to:
i) monitor usage of our APIs;
ii) identify who is using our APIs;
iii) apply appropriate access limits to requests; and
iv) revoke access in case of malicious use.
b) During the user account creation process, you will be required to provide us with certain information and choose a unique username and a password for your account. You agree to provide accurate, current and complete information during the account creation process and to update such information to keep it accurate, current and complete. We reserve the right to suspend or terminate your account if any information provided during the account creation process or thereafter proves to be inaccurate, not current or incomplete.
c) You are responsible for:
i) safeguarding your password(s);
ii) ensuring, where applicable, that only appropriate and authorised staff members are given access to your account and monitoring staff usage of the Platform to ensure compliance with these Terms;
iii) ensuring that logins and passwords are not shared with or disclosed to unauthorised individuals; and
iv) any activities or actions under your account, whether or not you have authorised such activities or actions.
4) Subscribing to APIs
a) Once registered, you can submit a Subscription Request for APIs on our Platform at any time.
b) We may approve your Subscription Request and/or make our approval subject to conditions, in which case you must comply with these conditions if you access or use the elements of the Platform to which the application relates.
c) You are responsible for:
i) managing your own subscriptions;
ii) ensuring that you have the appropriate number of subscription keys;
iii) your own development and other costs incurred in connection with your use of or access to the Platform, and any Content; and
iv) any costs or expense in relation to your compliance with these Terms.
d) We reserve the right to terminate your subscription depending on:
i) the nature and purpose of the integration between the API and a Customer Site;
ii) the manner and purpose for which the relevant Content will be used and distributed; and
iii) whether we believe you have a suitable support model in place to ensure appropriate support for users of your integration.
e) If you require Batch API Calls to be made for any purpose, you agree to manage these Batch API Calls in a manner, and at a time and frequency, that is acceptable to us, as agreed between you and us. To avoid any Operational Impact to us and our Partners, you acknowledge that the scheduling of such Batch API Calls is likely to be required outside of our Business Hours.
f) You will ensure that all information you provide to us in relation to your portal account, your integration, your subscription request, and/or our approval is complete, accurate, up-to-date, true, and not misleading in any way.
5) Public APIs
a) A list of Publicly available APIs is available via our Platform.
b) Subscription Requests to Public APIs will generally be automatically granted. However, on request you must supply additional information, documentation, or clarification relating to your Subscription Request.
6) Restricted APIs
a) Restricted APIs will not show up on the Platform by default. If you believe you require access to a Restricted API, you will need to request this specifically by emailing your Environment Canterbury contact or developers@ecan.govt.nz.
b) We will perform individual assessments of whether we grant user access to one or more of our Restricted APIs. We may choose not to proceed with your request until you have provided relevant information, documentation, or clarification.
c) If you’re an approved user, we grant access which allows you to see the API in the Platform and create subscriptions.
d) We require you to use our Sandbox API Portal first which allows us to review and approve integrations before we grant access to our production environment.
e) Once testing outcomes are deemed satisfactory, you can request access to our production environment.
7) Ongoing Platform use and use of data
a) We may modify, add, replace, discontinue or upgrade any or all of our APIs, and/or any Content, or other information contained within the Platform, at any time at our discretion and without incurring any liability to you.
b) You must not license, sublicense or resell any Content.
c) You must:
i) report any queries, faults, failures, errors or omissions in respect of the Content or the APIs directly to us; and
ii) ensure that any third party, to whom you supply the Content reports any queries, faults, failures, errors, or omissions in respect of the Content or the APIs directly to us.
d) You must ensure that you have the correct hardware and software configuration which is required for the APIs.
e) You must comply with the technical and organisational requirements outlined in the API Specifications when using the Platform.
f) For the purpose of ensuring your compliance with your responsibilities under these Terms, you acknowledge and agree that we may audit or track your use of the Platform from time to time.
g) You agree to respond in a timely manner to any reasonable request made to you by us for information relating to your compliance with your responsibilities under these Terms.
8) Prohibited uses
a) You must not use our Platform:
i) in any way that breaches, or would cause us to breach, any relevant law, regulation or any legal duty or obligation to any person;
ii) in any way that is unlawful or fraudulent or has any unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect;
iii) in any way that infringes other’s rights (including intellectual property rights);
iv) to transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other form of similar solicitation (spam); or
v) to knowingly transmit any data, send or upload any material that contains viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time-bombs, keystroke loggers, spyware, adware or any other harmful programs or similar computer code designed to adversely affect the operation of our Platform, or any computer software or hardware.
b) You also agree not to:
i) reproduce, duplicate, copy or re-sell any part of our website; or
ii) access (without authority), interfere with, damage or disrupt:
(1) any part of our website;
(2) any equipment or network on which our website is stored;
(3) any software used in the provision of our website; or
(4) any equipment or network or software owned or used by any third party.
9) Privacy
a) We may collect and hold ‘personal information’ (as that term is defined in the Privacy Act 2020) about you and any person to whom you allow access and use of the Platform in accordance with these Terms.
b) We will use such information for the purpose of contacting you, identifying you, administering your and any such person's access to and use of the Platform and maintaining the security of our systems.
c) Our Privacy Policy also applies to your use of the Platform. Please refer to our Privacy Policy for more details.
10) Support services
a) Support services may be available for registered users of the Platform. To enable us to provide support services, we may need to use information we have about you. You confirm that we can use any information we have about you to provide those support services.
11) Intellectual Property
a) All our Intellectual Property Rights shall be and remain owned by us.
b) If any Subscription Request made by you is granted by us, we grant to you a non-exclusive licence, with no right to sublicense, to access and use the Content for the purpose (or purposes) specified in your Subscription Request. This licence will terminate at the expiry or termination of these Terms.
c) Where any of the Content is used by you in any reports, publications, media statements or other documents, or oral statements or electronic record that is made available to any third party or the general public, Environment Canterbury shall be attributed as the source of the Content using this attribution statement: This work uses data sourced from Environment Canterbury. No Environment Canterbury logo shall be displayed unless our prior agreement is obtained.
d) All User Intellectual Property Rights shall be and remain owned by you.
e) If you upload information to our servers via a Restricted API, such information remains your property. You grant us a non-exclusive, perpetual, and irrevocable licence to use that information for the purpose for which it was provided or otherwise as permitted in accordance with:
i) applicable legislation (including, for example, the Resource Management Act 1991 and the Privacy Act 2020); or
ii) our Privacy Policy,
and to provide the API to you.
f) For the avoidance of doubt, any licence granted by you pursuant to clause 11)e) will survive the expiry or termination of these Terms.
12) Indemnity
a) Without any exclusion or limitation and to the fullest extent permissible by law, you hereby indemnify, hold harmless and defend us and each of our officers, employees, partners, agents and suppliers in respect of all damages, costs and expenses, including legal fees (on a solicitor and own client basis) and litigation expenses, arising out of or as a result of:
i) any breach of these Terms or otherwise in connection with your use of the APIs (including the Content);
ii) any act or omission for which you are responsible at law;
iii) any information and data provided by you;
iv) your use of the APIs; or
v) any infringement of the rights of any other person.
b) You indemnify us against any loss or damage to our systems or business as the result of any communication with you, or data received from or through you, including, without limitation, as a result of the transmission of any destructive code.
13) Warranties
a) You warrant to us that:
i) you will not make misleading or deceptive statements, particularly on public websites controlled by you (including the Customer Site), in relation to the Portal, Environment Canterbury or any services provided by us;
ii) you have fully complied with, and shall continue to comply fully with, all applicable laws and regulations;
iii) the Customer Site shall contain no material which is libellous or defamatory of us or any third party, pornographic, obscene or which brings Environment Canterbury into disrepute, or which is in breach of any third party intellectual property rights or third party confidentiality; and
iv) users of the Customer Site will be required to comply with terms that are no less protective of Environment Canterbury than the terms and conditions set out in these Terms in relation to their use of Content.
14) Disclaimer and liability
a) The Content is provided for general information purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice or information on which you should rely. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the Content.
b) To the extent permitted by law, we do not warrant that:
i) any information provided on our Platform is free from errors, reliable, accurate or complete;
ii) our Platform, APIs, or Content will always be available or uninterrupted. Access to our Platform is permitted on a temporary basis. We may suspend, withdraw, discontinue, or change all or any part of our Platform without notice; or
iii) our Platform will be secure or free from bugs or viruses.
c) We will not be liable:
i) if our Platform is unavailable at any time;
ii) for any corruption of data or information held by us; and
iii) to the fullest extent permitted by law for any loss (including, without limitation, consequential loss, loss of profits or loss of data), damage, cost or expense of any kind suffered or incurred in connection with your use of our Platform, including (without limitation) any action taken or reliance made by you on any information or material on our Platform.
15) Termination and suspension
a) We may immediately suspend or terminate your access to the Platform (or any element of it) at any time.
b) You can terminate your access to the Platform and your agreement to these Terms at any time by contacting us at developers@ecan.govt.nz.
16) Regulatory Capacity
a) You acknowledge that nothing in these Terms can by law fetter, restrict, or bind us in our regulatory capacity and any consents, acknowledgements, or agreements given by us in, or in relation to, these Terms should not be construed as consent, acknowledgement, or agreement by us in our regulatory capacity.
17) Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987
a) You acknowledge that any information supplied to or from us in relation to these Terms is subject to the provisions of the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987.
b) All data received via our APIs may be subject to a request under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987. Each request for data is considered on its merits to determine whether it should be withheld under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987, and with careful consideration of the relevant principles of the Privacy Act 2020.
18) General
a) These Terms are governed by, construed and take effect in accordance with the laws of New Zealand and the courts in New Zealand will have exclusive jurisdiction to settle any claim or dispute which may arise out of or in connection with these Terms.
19) Definitions
a) In these Terms, unless the context requires otherwise or terms are defined elsewhere, words beginning with capital letters must be interpreted by reference to the use of those words as set out below:
i) APIs means Environment Canterbury’s application programming interfaces.
ii) API Specifications means the specifications provided by Environment Canterbury relating to the APIs on the Environment Canterbury Sandbox API Portal and Production API Portal.
iii) Batch API Call means a single request for large amounts of data, which may have Operational Impact.
iv) Content means any data or other content that we make available on or through the Platform.
v) Customer Site means your website or application, on or through which you use Content, or make Content available to third parties.
vi) Environment Canterbury, us, we and our means Canterbury Regional Council, a regional council constituted pursuant to the Local Government Act 2002.
vii) Business Hours means Monday to Friday between 8.00am and 5.00pm New Zealand current time excluding public holidays.
viii) Intellectual Property Rights means all Intellectual Property Rights in, and made available by Environment Canterbury on, the Platform, including the Content on the Public APIs.
ix) Intellectual Property Rights means all intellectual property rights and interests arising in connection with the Platform and the APIs, including copyright, trademarks, designs, patents and other proprietary rights, recognised or protected by law.
x) Operational Impact means, without limitation, any interference or disruption to business operations for us or our Partners or performance issues, damage, interference or disruption caused to any other software or systems used by us or our Partners.
xi) Partner means organisations other than Environment Canterbury who have agreed to these Terms and are using the Environment Canterbury Platform.
xii) Platform means the platform which hosts Environment Canterbury’s APIs.
xiii) Production API Portal means the website operated by Environment Canterbury for the provision of Production versions of APIs, located at https://apidevelopers.ecan.govt.nz.
xiv) Public API has the meaning given at clause 1)a).
xv) Restricted API has the meaning given at clause 1)a).
xvi) Sandbox API Portal means the website operated by Environment Canterbury for the provision of a testing environment with a limited dataset against which developers can develop an integration, located at https://apidevelopers.sandbox.ecan.govt.nz/.
xvii) Subscription Request means a request submitted by you to us, under which you request to be granted access to one of our APIs.
xviii) User Intellectual Property Rights means all Intellectual Property Rights in any data uploaded by you to the Platform.
xix) You and your are references to each person who uses or access the Platform.