Key downplays worry over foreign sale data
Prime Minister John Key has downplayed concerns about the sale of large tracts of productive land to foreign buyers, saying the trend was not “alarming”.
He said a new survey on foreign investment did not provide a complete picture because it only included investment above a specified threshold.
KPMG’s Foreign Investment in New Zealand report showed increasing foreign investment in land, forests and other productive assets in the last two years.
Based on Overseas Investment Office (OIO) reports, the survey showed Canadians were the biggest foreign investors in New Zealand since 2013.
The OIO required notification of investments only if they were worth more than $100 million, or if they involved fisheries or culturally sensitive land.
Mr Key said the data did not take into account land sold back to New Zealanders by foreign owners.
He said the report would “shatter some of the thoughts” that China had a monopoly on foreign investment in NZ.
However, the survey showed a significant rise in Chinese investment, from 5.3 per cent of all investment in the last survey to 14 per cent.
The Prime Minister was also asked about the finding that 5 per cent of New Zealand’s productive land had been sold offshore in the past five years.
“I don’t think it’s alarming,” Mr Key said.
Opposition parties disagreed. Green Party co-leader James Shaw highlighted that 40 per cent of gross overseas investment was concentrated in agribusiness, energy and large scale real estate.
This meant New Zealand was “losing ownership of the building blocks of our economy”, he said.
Labour’s land information spokesman Stuart Nash said the report showed the glaring omissions in the Government’s data, because it did not reveal the value of the foreign investments to New Zealanders and the economy.
He said the OIO was failing to report whether promises by foreign companies to add value were being kept.