Source: New Zealand Government
About 100 of the world’s high-profile investors, business leaders, and construction companies are expected to visit New Zealand in March for a global investment summit, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop have announced.
“The Government is relentlessly focused on accelerating the growth New Zealand needs to lift our incomes, strengthen our businesses, and create opportunities for all Kiwis,” Mr Luxon says.
“That means we need to stop saying ‘no’ to growth opportunities like foreign investment and start saying ‘yes’.
“To make it clear we are open for business, the Government will host an international investment summit in March, highlighting partnership opportunities for overseas investment across our economy that will boost growth.
“I will open the summit and many Cabinet Ministers will be at the event to share the Government’s ambitions and plans over the two days.
“We’re using every tool in the box to kick our economy into high gear. We recently announced the creation of Invest NZ, a new agency to attract investment here, Fast-Track has started cutting through the red tape holding back important projects, and just yesterday we announced visa changes to attract international investors who are as excited about New Zealand’s bold growth agenda as we are.
“This is one of many announcements the Government will be making over the coming weeks and months as part of our ambitious Going for Growth plan.”
Mr Bishop says greater foreign investment and more partnerships with Government will help address our massive infrastructure gap.
“The investment summit will bring together around 100 leaders from global investment and construction companies, among others, to showcase our infrastructure vision and highlight upcoming investment and development opportunities.
“As well as showcasing upcoming infrastructure opportunities for partnership and investment, the summit will highlight changes to policy, regulation, and legislation that make it easier to do business here, along with other investment opportunities in a range of growth sectors and the Māori economy.
“Attendees will be left in no doubt that New Zealand is a country worth investing in.”
The Infrastructure Investment Summit is one of many growth initiatives in the Government’s first Quarterly Action Plan for 2025, which is being released today, Mr Luxon says.
“The plan has a strong focus on boosting growth through initiatives such as upgrading visa settings, delivering smarter regulation for our agriculture sector, and reshaping our planning rules so that people can get stuff done in this country.
“We have hit the ground running with many of the priorities in our Q1 plan already ticked off, including allowing digital nomads into New Zealand and laying the groundwork for AI to improve public services.”
Notes for editors
The New Zealand Infrastructure Investment Summit will take place in Auckland from 13-14 March.
Further detail will be made available in due course