The prophets of doom won't like this; the Herald reports:
The New Zealand economy grew at its fastest quarterly pace in five years as good weather stoked milk production, and led to greater dairy manufacturing. The kiwi dollar surged to above 80 US cents after the figures were released.Gross domestic product grew 1.1 per cent to almost $35 billion in the three months ended March 31, the fastest quarterly pace since March 2007, according to Statistics New Zealand. That's more than twice the 0.5 per cent pace forecast in a Reuters survey of economists and almost three times the Reserve Bank's 0.4 per cent projection.The government statistics bureau revised the three previous quarters to 0.4 per cent growth in each period, a cumulative increase of 1.2 percentage points.
This is very welcome news, althought the challenge for the government will be to see similar momentum maintained. But at a time where there has been so much negative economic news, this is a great result.
Business investment rose 2.1 per cent in the quarter, its biggest rise since December 2010, on more imports of plant and machinery and non-residential building work.
Getting people off welfare and into paid employment is one of the biggest challenges that the government faces. A growing economy will benefit us all.
6 comments:
A serious point. the grass grows better (hardle impacted by government!), the dairy fat content is good and its international price is good. Is that what we see as our future - a farm for global protein? This is serendipity, not the effect of a structural improvement in our economy. It is the low road writ large, especially as most of us think that we've extracted most of the added value from dairy fat that we can.
I'm guessing you're a glass-half-empty bloke Robert...
Sure; the emphasis on dairying is noted, but business investment growth of 2.1% for the quarter is a very positive number; after all, businesses and not governments create jobs.
Must be that cycleway finally paying off. How is the tourism sector doing with the great John Key at the helm BTW?
Funny you should mention the cycleway Judge; Wanganui's Green Party mayor was on here just a few weeks ago talking about just how much the wider Whanganui region will benefit from the Mountains to Sea Cycleway that opened in April.
And if I see John when he's in town tomorrow, I'll ask him about the tourism sector; just for you!
maybe Robert would be happier if we had less grass growth and dairy production? Great to see the Govt get petrol prices down though Robert.
The cycleways will be a great benefit to many people .. I guess the drudge is more into driving his car for fitness .. has he started his own blog yet?
Inveterately half-full, I assure you - and I applaud the hard work of the cows - but, and here's the challenge for all parties - dairy fat a modern economy does not make.....I take the point about investment, but unemployment is up, household expenditure is flat-lining, the exchange rate is caning us, the Christchurch rebuild boost looks to be delayed, and the government is bereft of ideas, apart from a now-delayed debt reduction single metric. We can do better thsn this.
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