Bay of Plenty (New Zealand electorate) seat for National's Tony Ryall, who has been returned easily at every election since the seat's re-establishment in . The upper central North Island is an area where New Zealand First has done well, frequently getting a higher vote share in seats in both the Bay of Plenty region and in the Waikato than it does nationally. The earlier Bay of Plenty electorate from 1893 to 1978 was held by William Kelly 1893–1896, William Herries 1896–1908, William MacDonald 1908–1920, Kenneth Williams 1920–1935, Gordon Hultquist 1935–1941, Bill Sullivan 1941–1957, Percy Allen 1957–1975 and Duncan MacIntyre 1975–1978. Williams had the distinction of
Countries dependent on the Bay of Bengal platform, which opened in 1994, was shut down in 2013. India's Reliance Industries began production in an offshore block near India's coast in 2009. The BIMSTEC countries view the Bay of Bengal as a common security space. The first conference of national security chiefs in the region was held in 2017. The Bay of Bengal has non-traditional security challenges of piracy, human trafficking, terrorist networks and drug smuggling, which has led to greater cooperation between the navies of Bangladesh, India, the United States and Thailand. The Bay of Bengal is a prime zone of strategic competition between two of Asia's