By any count the commercial opportunities associated with ‘green growth’ are enormous.
Pure Advantage’s strategy is simple. New Zealand urgently needs to improve its own environmental stewardship, to protect the clean, green image that benefits so much of what we produce and export.
By using our country’s natural advantages, our knowledge & skills, and with efficient resource use, we can maximise the the opportunities created by global green growth. We have to succeed here in New Zealand to be successful internationally. And if we aren’t successful internationally we won’t generate the wealth we need as a country to make the required investments in education, healthcare, the environment and infrastructure
For New Zealand it is likely that the biggest opportunities are in Asia and not with our traditional trading partners, Australia, the US and the UK. Over two-thirds of the global green stimulus post the global financial crisis was committed in Asia.
Countries like Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Singapore see huge opportunities from green growth, but they also recognize that they are vulnerable to their dependence on imported natural resources. To reduce that reliance these countries are investing heavily in alternative energy and energy efficiency.
According to a UN report published in 2010 Korea is 97% dependent on fossil fuel imports. Under the “National Strategy for Green Growth” plan Korea intends to investment around USD85 billion over a 5 year period on the more efficient use of resources.
In identifying opportunities in Asia though, understanding China is the key; as they are the main determinant of demand and pricing. Effectively, what China wants will go up in price and what China sells will fall in price.
For a country like New Zealand with a clean green competitive advantage and a FTA with China the potential opportunities are enormous. Forestry and water are just two.
China plans to expand its forest stock by around 600 million m³ over the course of the plan (by comparison New Zealand’s timber exports in 2010 were approximately 11 million m³). For New Zealand with its expertise and credentials in sustainable forestry management there are opportunities not just in timber exports but in plantation management, technology and research.
In water China’s stated aim is to cut water consumption per unit of industrial output by 30%. This is a country where over 160 cities don’t have access to clean drinking water, and where an estimated 30% of the rivers and 50% of the lakes are graded 5+ (rated as being too polluted for industrial or agricultural use), plus an estimated half of all the water used in agriculture never makes it onto the crops it is intended for.
With New Zealand expertise in water management and technologies, along with newly acquired expertise and technologies, as we clean up our own act around water usage, we should be aligning ourselves with these opportunities in Asia.
There is therefore, a significant opportunity for NZ, not just in China but across Asia, for the delivery of efficient agricultural methods, sustainable forestry, water, waste management, clean food production, clean technology and geothermal.
There is little coordinated thinking and planning in New Zealand around what those opportunities are and how New Zealand is best placed to take advantage of them. We need a clearer plan to focus on what the game changing opportunities are for our country.
We need to focus on the fact that if our clean and green brand is a competitive advantage, which most exporters would agree it is, then we must be more honest about the gap between the rhetoric and the reality. We cannot afford to simply pay lip service to the protecting our environmental credentials if we are going to maximise the use of the NZ brand. We’ve got to walk the talk.
And this requires the buy-in, support, and coordination of many stakeholders, including corporates, Iwi, local government, political parties, and most importantly, the people of New Zealand. All supported by regulatory and fiscal policy changes that encourage and focus on growth.
Denmark is often quoted as a good example of how a country has adapted to the opportunities available in the alternative energy space. However Denmark’s transformation into the world’s largest exporter of wind technology, a USD 9 billion export industry, wasn’t driven by a simple belief in global warming and climate change, it was driven by the oil shock in the 1970s and the resulting desire for energy security.
The Danes themselves admit that they got lucky, as post-Kyoto, as the demand for wind power took off.
NZ doesn’t need to be lucky, we just need some clearer strategic thinking and better planning around how we organise our resources to take advantage of the opportunities available in order to generate a better outcome for all Kiwis.
In simple terms then, Pure Advantage’s idea is to the take the ‘luck’ out of the equation, and to get New Zealand focused via a clear and robust vision for the future, a strategy based on analysis and planning, the ability to influence and impact policy to help implement the vision, and a desire to help create a better New Zealand for all.