Waikato regional economic profile - Waikato Regional Council

12 Key findings and next stepsThe Waikato region is important to the national economy and there is a high degreeof inter-regional and intra-regional interdependence. This highlights the importance ofhard and soft networks: Waikato contributes approximately 8.5 per cent to gross domestic product,which is slightly lower to its share of land area and population. Several sectors are part of national value chains and align well with nationalpriorities: dairy, meat and other food manufacturing, high value manufacturing(such as agritech and aviation), forestry and wood product manufacturing.Waikato relies on the Ports of Auckland and Tauranga and Auckland Airport forinternational connections. Its central location between the Auckland, Bay ofPlenty, Hawke’s Bay, Manawatu-Whanganui and Taranaki regions make it anationally significant transport corridor. Hamilton Airport and the regional roadnetwork are important for maintaining inter- and intra- regional connections.Waikato is New Zealand’s premier electricity region, generating more electricitythan any other single region in the country. The region has almost 40 per centof installed generation capacity. It is also an important corridor of the nationalgas network. Waikato is the most important minerals producing region in New Zealand,representing more than one-third of New Zealand’s coal output. Waikato is alsothe largest interregional “exporter” of economic aggregate and industrialminerals for roading material. This goes predominantly to Auckland, which“imports” from Waikato almost 25 per cent of its needs. Hamilton is the region’s “central business district” with concentrations ofemployment, research, tertiary education and manufacturing. Its industrystrengths are inextricably linked to the primary production of the surroundingregion, on which it also relies for labour and materials.Intra-regional transport, including roads and public transport, is vital to ensureequitable access to valuable assets, such as tertiary education and high-valueemployment.While the Waikato region contains most, if not all, of the constituent parts of theknowledge generation and diffusion sub-system (public research organisations,technology and knowledge transfer agents, educational and skills developmentorganisations) – mostly concentrated in Hamilton – many other importantorganisations are in other parts of New Zealand.The Waikato region’s economy is closely tied to the resources and wasteassimilation services provided by its environment. Finite productive land, poor waterquality and reliance on finite fossil fuels, for example, mean that neither “business asusual” nor “more of the same” is sustainable: Three of the region’s major industries (livestock and cropping farming, dairycattle farming and forestry and logging) occupy 83 per cent of the region’sproductive land.There has been a net deterioration in river water quality across the region. Inmany cases the deterioration probably results from the widespread and intenseuse of land for pastoral farming.Water is fully allocated in some parts of the region and others are approachingfull allocation. It is estimated that two thirds (66.3 per cent) of the total 36,546 terajoules ofenergy consumed by the Waikato regional economy to the year ending MarchPage 144 Doc # 2069885