New Zealand

Chris Tyler, UCL and Peter Gluckman Most people think or at least hope their government is doing a good job in the face of COVID-19, according to the polls. But there can be no doubt that governments around the world were ill-prepared for this pandemic. Country after country has been locking their citizens in their homes to slow the spread …

Meru Sheel, Australian National University; Charlee J Law, Australian National University, and Danielle Ingle, Australian National University Recent headlines have suggested COVID-19 can spread up to four metres, drawing into question the current advice to maintain 1.5 metres between people to prevent the spread of the virus. The news was based on a study conducted in Wuhan, China, and published …

New Zealand has a challenge to broaden its Asia markets and agricultural consultant Keith Woodford asks: will New Zealand broaden its Asian perspective, or will China always dominate as a market destination? Over the last 12 years, we have seen a remarkable increase in exports to China since the Free Trade Agreement was signed in 2008. I recall in that …

Miles Hurrell, chief executive of Fonterra, gave a Q&A through the Trans-Tasman Business Circle on resilient leadership in challenging times. Tim McCready gives an overview of what was discussed. The full interview is available at the bottom of this article. Fonterra started to become aware of the escalating Covid-19 situation in China in January, says chief executive Miles Hurrell. Fonterra …

Dougal Sutherland, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington; Arindam Basu, University of Canterbury; Malcolm Campbell, University of Canterbury; Martin Berka, Massey University; Michael Baker, University of Otago, and Richard Shaw, Massey University New Zealand will begin easing its national lockdown from next Tuesday, but only after a five-day extension of some of the world’s strictest COVID-19 restrictions. New …

Martin Berka, Massey University New Zealand has the most stringent COVID-19 policy restrictions in the world, matched only by Israel and India, according to Oxford University’s coronavirus government response tracker. The current level 4 restrictions have brought the number of cases down, and I am delighted the government acted quickly and strongly. But the newly announced level 3 conditions remain …

Brendan Coates, Grattan Institute and Jonathan Nolan, Grattan Institute Less than a month after restrictions first took effect, Australia appears to have contained the spread of COVID-19 more successfully than we could have possibly imagined. But we’ve done so at unimaginable cost: large swathes of the economy have been shut down, leaving the livelihoods of millions of Australians on hold …

Tim Groser addresses the US/NZ Partnership Forum in Auckland, 30 June 2015. Full speech provided below. I would like to thank our two co-chairs, the Hon Simon Power, Chair of the NZ-US Council and Stu Van Soyoc, President of the US-based counterpart organisation for assuming joint responsibility for the Partnership Forum. I think it is a great idea for us …

  Listen to the full episode of Q+A in the podcast below

Richard Shaw, Massey University New Zealand’s general election is currently set for September 19. Under ordinary circumstances, campaigning for the election and two referenda that will take place alongside would be heating up by now, but the country is three quarters of the way through a comprehensive level 4 lockdown. The first question is whether the election should take place …