School students and others around the country are protesting for climate change action from the government.
School Strike 4 Climate Christchurch spokesperson Aurora Garner-Randolph, 17, said she expected between 15,000 to 20,000 people to participate.
After the fallout from the Auckland floods and the devastating effects of Cyclone Gabrielle across the North Island, the organisers of the protest have five demands, including no new fossil fuel mining or exploration and a rebate for e-bikes.
Other demands include greater marine protection, funding a transition to regenerative farming and lowering the voting age to 16.
More than 1000 people of all ages have joined the Wellington march, which arrived at Parliament in the afternoon.
The crowd of protesters, who were mainly young people, stretched half the length of Lambton Quay, with shoppers stopping in doorways to watch them pass, some breaking into spontaneous applause.
In Christchurch, people gathered at Cathedral Square and headed to the city council buildings.
In Auckland, the march is starting at Britomart Station and going to Victoria Park, where a concert will continue until 7pm.
Auckland Transport said more than 1000 people were expected to march in the city. Public transport users can also expect detours, cancellations and delays.
Speaking from Christchurch on Friday, Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said the government was making a lot of progress on many of the topics students were striking about.
"Climate change has been at the forefront of the government's agenda for the past five years and it will continue to be so," Hipkins told reporters.
"If you look at the emissions reduction plans that we've already set out, you can see that we're making significant progress - of course we've still got some heavy lifting to do though, there's no question about that and the government's absolutely committed to doing it."
There was no question we were seeing the effects of climate change here and now, Hipkins said.
"What's happened with our flooding, with the cyclone, we're going to see more of these sorts of events, and that just I think underscores to New Zealand how important it is that we do two things: one is that we do everything we can to reduce climate change, the human-induced effects on the climate," he said.
"The second is that we also look at how we can be more resilient and how we can make sure that we're adapting to accept that actually there are going to be more of these sorts of events in the future.
"Many of the things that are going to make the biggest difference to our emissions are going to take some time, so when we think about transitioning to more renewable energy use ... that doesn't happen overnight, it requires some hard work and some ongoing work to make that happen."
On the voting age, he said people should expect to hear something further on the government's intentions on that soon.
"The courts made a ruling, Parliament now has to consider that, that's been referred to a select committee for consideration. How the government ultimately responds to that process is something that we will turn our minds to in due course."
In November last year, the Supreme Court declared the voting age of 18 inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act. Any change would require the backing of three quarters of MPs, or a majority vote in a referendum.
New Zealanders on average in 2021 produced 6.59 tonnes of carbon dioxide each - about 40 percent above the world average, according to the Our World In Data Global Carbon Project. Climate Action Tracker, an international project which rates countries' efforts towards meeting their climate obligations, ranks New Zealand's efforts overall as "highly insufficient".
New Zealand's farming industry also produces a lot of methane, which though it does not remain in the atmosphere as long as CO2, traps a lot more heat.
But the country's small population meant it contributed only about 0.09 percent of the world's total C02 emissions.
Garner-Randolph said it did not matter that Aotearoa only accounted for a tiny fraction of the world's emissions.
"Now isn't the time for finger-pointing and saying, 'Oh other countries are producing far more emissions.' It's our responsibility as global citizens, as players on the global stage, to step up and do our part, no matter how big or small it is.
"And we have incredibly high per capita emissions here in Aotearoa, so although we may be small, we are high individual emitters and that needs to change."
The last school climate strikes took place in September.
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