Latest / Best of Business / Catherine Beard: Business New Zealand Director of Agency on a reform to the Overseas Investments Act

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Catherine Beard: Business New Zealand Director of Agency on a reform to the Overseas Investments Act · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks B Follow
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  Speaker 2: So the government's announced an overhaul of the Overseas Investment Act.
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  Speaker 2: It will make it easier for businesses to receive international
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  Speaker 2: investment and for international investors to invest here. Business New
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  Speaker 2: Zealand Director of Advocacy Katherine Beard joins us.
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  Speaker 1: Now, how the Catherine, Good morning.
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  Speaker 2: What's your reaction.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, look, this is a very good move. We've been
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  Speaker 3: advocating for this for a number of years now. New
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  Speaker 3: Zealand's actually one of the hardest places to invest in
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  Speaker 3: the OECD, and while the rest of the world has
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  Speaker 3: increased investment, our investment line has flatlined. So very good move,
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  Speaker 3: Very good.
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  Speaker 2: It's fair to say that most New Zealanders would really
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  Speaker 2: like to see some foreign capital invested in New Zealand businesses,
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  Speaker 2: rather than just making it easier for foreign companies to
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  Speaker 2: come in and therefore take our money overseas. I see
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  Speaker 2: on the Telly last night they use Ikea as an example.
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  Speaker 2: But Ikera has spent their money over the last six
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  Speaker 2: years to come to New Zealand to then get the
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  Speaker 2: profit to repatriate them of course all we get is
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  Speaker 2: a bit of employment. Isn't the real trick to keep
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  Speaker 2: the profits here to get foreigners to invest in New Zealand.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, look absolutely, And if I think about all our
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  Speaker 3: big successful exporting businesses, most of them will have foreign investment.
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  Speaker 3: And they don't just bring the money, they bring the
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  Speaker 3: connections to international markets. So a lot of our exporters
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  Speaker 3: who really smash it out there on the world market
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  Speaker 3: have foreign investment. Without it, you're just really not that
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  Speaker 3: competitive because you can't get big enough. And I would
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  Speaker 3: argue that the jobs they create, those frontier firms that
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  Speaker 3: are all high paid jobs, you know, those people are
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  Speaker 3: paying tax. The business pays tax it grows, so you know,
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  Speaker 3: there's always trade offs. But certainly for the rest of
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  Speaker 3: the world it's been a winning move and New Zealand's
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  Speaker 3: sort of been sitting on the sideline.
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  Speaker 2: Well yeah, the opponents say the trade off is that
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  Speaker 2: you every now and then you lose key assets. But
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  Speaker 2: of course David Seaman was saying that there will be
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  Speaker 2: a The Minister can still say no if he feels
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  Speaker 2: it's bad for business. Is that right, It's correct.
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  Speaker 3: So they've actually they are exempting a few things. So
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  Speaker 3: they're putting farmland and residential and fishing quota more on
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  Speaker 3: a slow track for decisions, so there will be protections there.
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  Speaker 3: And you know when it comes to land, actually you
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  Speaker 3: can't take the land with you. You can't put in
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  Speaker 3: a suitcase and take it overseas. So if a foreign
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  Speaker 3: investor doesn't make a success of it, then they will
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  Speaker 3: have to sell to somebody else who can.
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  Speaker 2: All right, have you done any studies or have you
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  Speaker 2: seen any studies that has put a dollar value on
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  Speaker 2: how much this might improve our economy?
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  Speaker 3: Ah, look, that's a huge unknown. I think we just
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  Speaker 3: need to get the welcome matt properly out there. Other
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  Speaker 3: countries have and you know, we've just made it incredibly
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  Speaker 3: hard and frustrating to invest here.
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  Speaker 2: Katherine Beer, I thank you very much for your time
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  Speaker 2: and your expert seas and having yourself a great morning.
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