Chatham Rock Phosphate has been granted a 20-year mining permit to extract phosphate nodules from an 820 square kilometre area of the Chatham Rise, the first key step in its approvals to strip the sea floor of the fertiliser chemical. The permit is the first granted under the amended Crown Minerals Act which came into effect in May. The proposal …

The New Zealand government posted a smaller operating deficit than expected in the first four months of the financial year as it reported a bigger personal tax take and reaped more from customs duties on imported tobacco. The Crown’s operating balance before gains and losses (obegal) was $1.75 billion in the four months ended Oct. 31, smaller than the $2.14 …

The Commerce Commission is consulting with the telecommunications industry over what price Chorus can charge rivals to access its copper telephone lines, suggesting a review process could be accelerated and the final price backdated. The Commerce Commission is reviewing the price by building a full cost model on Chorus’s unbundled local loop, which lets retailers rent the lines for voice …