New Zealand Economy

New Zealand has a modern, prosperous and developed market economy with an estimated gross domestic product (GDP) at purchasing power parity (PPP) per capita of roughly US$28,250.[n10] The currency is the New Zealand dollar, informally known as the "Kiwi dollar"; it also circulates in the Cook Islands (see Cook Islands dollar), Niue, Tokelau, and the PitcairnIslands.[178] New Zealand was ranked 5th in the 2011 Human Development Index,[179] 4th in the The Heritage Foundation's 2012 Index of Economic Freedom,[180] and 13th in INSEAD's 2012 GlobalInnovation Index.[181]


Historically, extractive industries have contributed strongly to New Zealand's economy, focussing at different times on sealing, whaling, flax, gold, kaurigum, and native timber.[183] With the development of refrigerated shipping in the 1880s meat and dairy products were exported to Britain, a trade which provided the basis for strongeconomic growth in New Zealand.[184] High demand for agricultural products from the United Kingdom and the United States helped New Zealanders achieve higher living standards than bothAustralia and Western Europe in the 1950s and 1960s.[185] In 1973 New Zealand's export market was reduced when the United Kingdom joined the European Community[186] and othercompounding factors, such as the 1973 oil and 1979 energy crisis, led to a severe economic depression.[187] Living standards in New Zealand fell behind those of Australia and Western Europe,and by 1982 New Zealand had the lowest per-capita income of all the developed nations surveyed by the World Bank.[188] Since 1984, successive governments engaged in major macroeconomicrestructuring (known first asRogernomics and then Ruthanasia), rapidly transforming New Zealand from a highly protectionist economy to a liberalised free-trade economy.[189][190