Tag Archives: Economist (The)

Bazball Revolution Could Change Test Cricket

Bazball Revolution Could Change Test Cricket

The England cricket team’s recent “fast and fearless”, and “wonderful”, approach to the game has been dubbed “Bazball”, after a nickname for England’s new coach, New Zealander Brendon McCullum who was appointed in May,…

Economist Writes on Our “Islands of Liberality”

Economist Writes on Our “Islands of Liberality”

“More notable than the appearance of Ardern’s cabinet is how voters answered one question on their ballot paper: should New Zealand legalise assisted dying for those with a terminal illness?” The Economist asks….

What Next for New Zealand’s Economy?

What Next for New Zealand’s Economy?

“In New Zealand, a country of five million people, new COVID-19 cases have been in the single digits for most of the past week. Australia reported just seven new infections on 23 April. That…

Why New Zealand’s Other All Blacks Matter

Why New Zealand’s Other All Blacks Matter

“The Māori All Blacks are a source of rugby-playing pride in a community that has struggled economically,” The Economist reports in a sports feature. “The team … is an enduring oddity.” “In late 2018, as…

Māhia World’s Best Spot for Rocket Launching

Māhia World’s Best Spot for Rocket Launching

“The Māhia Peninsula has been a holidaymakers’ haven for decades. It offers sandy beaches, hot springs and scenic trails. And, for those of a technological mindset, it also offers the world’s first private orbital-rocket-launching…

Why New Zealand Has So Many Gang Members

Why New Zealand Has So Many Gang Members

“For a quiet country, New Zealand has a peculiar problem with gangs. It is reckoned to have one of the highest membership rates in the world. In a population of 4.7m, police count over…

Coping with Changing Trade Patterns

Coping with Changing Trade Patterns

“The future of British trade after Brexit is shrouded in uncertainty. It is an unprecedented process, so it is hard to know where to look for clues as to how it may work out,”…

New Zealand Debates Tramping Track Fee

New Zealand Debates Tramping Track Fee

“New Zealand’s chief conservation officer, Lou Sanson, caused a stir in October by suggesting that it might be time to start charging tourists for using the country’s wilderness tracks,” The Economist reports. “New Zealanders are…

NZ Mines for Gold in Rio

NZ Mines for Gold in Rio

The lead-up to this year’s Summer Olympics has included construction delays, protests against Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff, and a data leak suggesting the samples of one in seven competing track athletes appear “highly suggestive…

Lecretia’s Fight Lives On

Lecretia’s Fight Lives On

The case brought by terminally ill New Zealand lawyer Lecretia Seales has become part of the larger worldwide right-to-die debate. A feature story in the June 27, 2015, edition of The Economist…

Maori Water Rights up for Debate

Maori Water Rights up for Debate

“Unlike many countries,” The Economist reports, “New Zealand is blessed with abundant fresh water. Its temperate climate, regular rainfall over much of the country, and thousands of lakes and rivers ensure a…

PM John Key Pushes National Rebranding with New Flag

PM John Key Pushes National Rebranding with New Flag

Prime Minister John Key, recently re-elected to a third term, is a cast-iron monarchist, the Economist writes. “Even so, he is bent on coming up with a new flag for New Zealand, one in…

New Zealand in Top 10 on Asian Creative Productivity Index

New Zealand in Top 10 on Asian Creative Productivity Index

A new Creative Productivity Index ranks New Zealand sixth out of 22 Asia Pacific countries which are most efficient at turning creative inputs into tangible innovation. The Creative Productivity Index was developed by…

New Zealand Immigrant Numbers On the Up

New Zealand Immigrant Numbers On the Up

“One in four people living in New Zealand was born outside the country, according to figures released last month from the 2013 census of New Zealand’s 4.5 million people,” the Economist reports. “That is an…

Booker Judge Explains Catton’s Genius

Booker Judge Explains Catton’s Genius

Eleanor Catton’s Booker-winning The Luminaries is a novel in which almost everyone is obsessed with the acquisition of wealth, writes Robert Macfarlane in Intelligent Life, the sister publication to The Economist. But of all…

Cold, Hard Cash Works Better than Welfare

Cold, Hard Cash Works Better than Welfare

Giving money directly to the poor is one of the best ways to raise education levels and lift people out of poverty, a study by the University of Otago shows. Development economist Dr Sarah…

Dropping Sentimentality with Print Paywalls

Dropping Sentimentality with Print Paywalls

“Last November Mike Darcey, then a top executive at BSkyB, a British satellite-television company, received a phone call from Rupert Murdoch, the boss of News Corporation,” The Economist writes. “Murdoch wanted him to run…

Doing It for Themselves

Doing It for Themselves

“If you are a working woman, you would do well to move to New Zealand,” according to The Economist, who have compiled their own “‘glass-ceiling index’ to show where women have the best chance…

Review Of Whimsy

Review Of Whimsy

Magazine illustrator New Zealander Peter Campbell’s work is collected in Artwork and describes his 30-year career as art director, contributor (writing more than 300 articles) and, from 1993, cover artist of the…

Non-farmers Get Look In

Non-farmers Get Look In

“The only truly global New Zealand company, with annual revenue of almost $20 billion, Fonterra operates in 100 countries and has 10,500 farmer-owners,” The Economist writes. “Rabobank of the Netherlands ranks it the world’s…

Lifestyle Comes At A Price

Lifestyle Comes At A Price

Auckland and Wellington have risen in their rankings of the most expensive cities to live in, with Auckland jumping nine places to rank 15 and Wellington rising 16 places to rank 17th with London….

Vision for a Settled Ground

Vision for a Settled Ground

‘“Happy the country that never makes the front page’ we said recently of Australia,’” Auckland Banyan columnist writes for The Economist. “Even more apt for its smaller sibling across the Tasman Sea,…

Entrepreneurs Abound

Entrepreneurs Abound

New Zealand has begun 2011 as one of the most entrepreneurial countries on the planet — “an entrepreneurial powerhouse,” according to The Economist. With a recent study by The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation finding…

Liquidity rules

Liquidity rules

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand has “become the first authority to pass hard-and-fast rules for liquidity since the crisis”, writes The Economist in an article called ‘Lord of the Ratios’. Locally incorporated banks…

Green Light District

Green Light District

New Zealand’s “liberalisation” of the world’s oldest profession is, according to the Economist, a success story, where in 2003 the magazine writes, “that country decriminalised the sex trade with a boldness that exceeded that…

Europe Follows Lead

Europe Follows Lead

New Zealand is the first English-speaking country in the world to have banned smacking and Europe wants to follow suit. The New Zealand police were reassured when they won the right to apply the…

Peaceful Isles

Peaceful Isles

New Zealand comes in at number four on the second annual Global Peace Index released by Britain’s Economist  Intelligence Unit. A survey on the harmoniousness of the world’s nations, the Index evaluates…

Beyond the Ugg

Beyond the Ugg

No longer are New Zealand’s fashion tastes being derided for unbecoming tracksuits and shoes, the local fashion industry is pinning the country on the style map. New Zealand is now home to a vibrant…

Peace of Mind

Peace of Mind

NZ has been named the world’s second most peaceful country in the inaugural Global Peace Index, a study commissioned by Australian IT entrepreneur and philanthropist Steve Killelea and sponsored by peace advocates such as…

All in a Day’s Work

All in a Day’s Work

The Economist reports on ructions to repair the dire finances and arcane structure at Oxford University. Proposals by new vice chancellor John Hood to centralize decision-making and change the way in which dons’ work…

Knowledge Economist

Knowledge Economist

Finance Minister and Deputy PM, Dr. Michael Cullen, articulates the edge phenomenon in a lengthy interview with the  Economist. ” a very significant solid eclectic range of niche manufacturing and service industries which have developed in…

Nature vs. Nurture

Nature vs. Nurture

The argument over whether environment or genetics plays the bigger part in creating violent dispositions is moving towards a tentative reconciliation. London-based research has proposed that the level of a particular gene – MAOA, which regulates an…

Business Class Destination

Business Class Destination

New Zealand is ranked the fourth best place to do business in Asia, according to prominent think tank – the Economist Intelligence Unit. The rankings took into account 70 factors, including political risk and corruption, key…

I Can See Your Heart Beat

I Can See Your Heart Beat

Auckland University’s Bioengineering Institute  leads ground-breaking new research into heart and lung modeling and software development. Led by Dr Peter Hunter, the team of in silico biologists translate human organs “into thousands of mathematical equations and millions…

The Heart of the Matter

The Heart of the Matter

Dr Peter Hunter, of the University of Auckland, has created a “virtual heart” – hailed by Economist magazine as a spectacular example of in silico biology, an emerging discipline that brings computing power to bear on…

Global Warning

Global Warning

Kiwi LSE economist Robert Wade, tracks the winners and losers in the big-stakes game of globalisation and stirs debate with new thinking: “Growing inequality is analogous to global warming. Its effects are diffuse and long-term ……

Dollar Getting Burgered

Dollar Getting Burgered

The Economist’s Big Mac index indicates the New Zealand dollar is 40-50% under fair value. Burgernomics in more detail.

Into the Black

Into the Black

New Zealand leads the pack in debt reduction, cutting government debt from 65% of GDP in 1993 to 31% in 1999.  

Youth Voice

Youth Voice

Wellington’s youth council is part of the international phenomenon of youth engagement, pushing youngsters into leadershipand decision making roles.  

Shears, Mate

Shears, Mate

Among elections, space-stations and UFO conventions, Masterton’s 40th annual Golden Shears competition rates a mention.

Go Babies

Go Babies

Two babies per woman is the minimum for population stability – New Zealand, Iceland and the US are the only wealthy nations reproducing at or above replacement rate.

Wildlife Sting

Wildlife Sting

Flora and fauna around the world are competing against introduced animals – New Zealand’s kaka is losing the battle over food sources to wasps, but island sanctuaries are a success story.

Can the Kiwi Economy Fly?

Can the Kiwi Economy Fly?

A contrary view: “recent claims that New Zealand’s economic experiment has failed, and that it therefore needs to change course, do not stand up”.

Out of Africa Theory of Evolution

Out of Africa Theory of Evolution

The Economist ponders the ‘where did we come from’ question, referring to the out-of-Africa theory first developed by New Zealand biochemist, the revolutionary Allan Wilson, and his colleague Rebecca Cann. They studied genetic material from a variety…

Muse behind Watership Down

Muse behind Watership Down

Ronald Lockley, internationally renowned naturalist, died in New Zealand on April 12, aged 96. The Economist obituary dryly notes that “New Zealanders liked Ronald Lockley, admired his reputation as a protector of nature, and…