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SouthMACH 2013 is now in the last afternoon of the two day event. Below are pictures from the show. Cold weather was everywhere, but enthusiasm was high.      

BusinessNZ Chief Executive Phil O’Reilly has been elected Chair of the Business and Industry Advisory Council (BIAC) to the OECD. The BIAC is the voice of business at the OECD – the world’s foremost provider of integrated statistics and fact-based policy recommendations. The BIAC network includes national business, industry and employer associations from OECD members and observer countries, as well as international sector-specific associate experts. Mr O’Reilly said it was an honour to serve the BIAC, whose advocacy was vital for growth and employment internationally, and a great opportunity for New Zealand business to contribute to this work. Mr O’Reilly has been a member of the Board of the BIAC for three years. He will continue in his role as Chief Executive of BusinessNZ in addition to serving as BIAC Chair.        

*By Kim Campbell Manufacturing in New Zealand has always been a vital, misunderstood and major component of our economy. Nothing seems about to change that. While various sub sectors of manufacturing might come to be labeled ‘food and beverages,’ ‘biotech’ or ‘marine,’ the new names don’t alter the activities described, which international analysts, economists and statisticians refer to as manufacturing. That’s no surprise; each of these sectors is involved in the transformation of goods to satisfy consumer and industry customer needs and they typically offer a range of back up professional consultancy and expertise to support their value proposition. For some, the value from the services they offer has overtaken sales of hardware. Manufacturing in New Zealand traditionally faces powerful forces: the need to process our commodity goods for buyers that often, ironically, want to import raw and undifferentiated. Many countries want to use the raw materials of others to keep their own populations employed. But as producers of them we should understand our own resources better than anyone else, and we stand to win the most value from them, provided we keep on investing sufficiently in the R&D that leads to a deep understanding of them. Besides the price earned from commodities is often volatile and fluctuates more than for highly transformed goods, hence contributing to our currency’s volatility. The second big challenge is we’re a long way from markets. Our products spend a long time on the water, and this together with a strong currency threatens our competitiveness. In responding to these challenges our manufacturers have adopted not one, but three routes to the future. These are first, to automate processing and handling. This has led in particular to expertise in efficient stainless steel fabrication, drying, canning, refrigeration and some extraction technology. The capability to produce a wide […]

Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York and an astute and highly successful businessman, commented recently on the merits of a university education as against gaining trade qualifications. He says that being a tradesman is an integral and highly required skill these days because there is surety in the work to come. Be the trade electrical, building, engineering, painting or whatever…there is always a need for tradespeople. Houses are always being built and businesses have an on-going need for skilled staff to run the Factory Floor in manufacturing companies. With mounting student-loan debt and increasingly high unemployment, some people might question whether a university degree is still worth the cost. Mayor Bloomberg suggests that mediocre students skip university altogether and become plumbers instead. Of course, a university degree provides a student with a lot more options. A job as a plumber might cut down on student loans and time, but it may keep a person restricted in the longer term. In today’s economy it helps to have a wide range of skills. Even a lot of basic jobs require higher education, and while it might take more time for the job to start paying back, it will be ultimately worth it. A university education can be expected to pay back in the long term. Picking the right course to doÊis very important. With the thousands of graduates coming through our universities in New Zealand each year it is a question of where and when they can be employed to maximise the time, effort and money invested in achieving the qualification.  This is where our manufacturing companies and business leaders come into play. To create the level playing field so that available positions across the country are known. Might not be a bad idea to have a National Barometer of growth and […]