If I ruled the world – the reality of population growth in NZ
Recently a discussion between Christchurch City councillors was debated at length in the media. Now the councillors and Mayor may have just been spitballing… but the headline read
Canterbury with a population of 2 million?
The story detailed councillor Raf Manji enthusing about a Greater Christchurch spreading out across the plains. Stuff reported Manji as saying, “Christchurch itself, as the denser metropolis, would happily house a million people … then linked by good rail, the straggle of satellite towns from Ashburton to Amberley could fatten into spacious developments that are home to a further million.”
Manji believed this could happen because Christchurch, unlike Auckland, was not geographically constrained. Mmmmmm?
I was fascinated by Manji’s optimism, and confounded by the copious list of readers who bought into the chance that Canterbury’s current growth could escalate to such a level and commented on the two million vision.
Perhaps Manji’s comments were aspirational, however Statistics NZ projections (released last week) surely signal a very low likelihood of massive ongoing growth in Christchurch. Actually, Statistics NZ project growth in every region will slow in the next 30 years.
The 30-year forecast for Canterbury suggests population change of between 0.2% and 1.4% per annum depending on whether you pick up the low, medium or high figures. Thus, using the high projection, the regional population might be somewhere in the vicinity of 854,800 in 2043 – a far cry from two million.
The following table presents the Statistics NZ projections at 5 year intervals.
Table 1. | ||||||||||
Regional Council Area | Projection | Population at 30 June | Population change2013-43 | |||||||
2013 | 2018 | 2023 | 2028 | 2033 | 2038 | 2043 | Number | Average annual (percent) | ||
CanterburyRegion | High | 629,400 | 675,700 | 722,200 | 767,800 | 811,900 | 854,800 | 291,900 | 1.4 | |
Medium | 562,900 | 611,900 | 638,900 | 665,000 | 689,000 | 710,300 | 729,200 | 166,300 | 0.9 | |
Low | 594,200 | 602,000 | 607,600 | 610,200 | 609,600 | 606,000 | 43,100 | 0.2 |
Source: Statistics New Zealand, subnational population projections, 2013(base)-2043
Auckland is likely to hog around 60 percent of New Zealand’s population growth in the next three decades. In fact Auckland is the only place likely to reach Manji’s magical 2 million mark any time soon. Using the medium forecast figures that should occur around 2033, or using the high figure around 2029 (…imagine the traffic).
But…. just spit-balling… what would need to happen in Canterbury for that region to experience growth sufficient to breach the two million mark?
We know that births and deaths are following relatively stable trends, so only a huge swing in migration (and it would need to be both internal and overseas) could have such a huge influence on Canterbury’s future population. For that to happen, something many times more powerful than diary giant Fonterra’s influence on the area would need to occur… a socio-economic equivalent of a lotto win… perhaps a rich vein of platinum, or gold, or diamonds in the Southern Alps?
However, Manji was on to something when he indirectly referred to the centralisation of New Zealand’s population. All regions are projected to experience some growth, yet more than a third of territorial authorities will have a smaller population in 2043 than in 2013. In fact deaths will outnumber births in two thirds of our territorial authorities in 30 years.
I don’t think that there is a single councillor in New Zealand who does not wish and work for growth and prosperity for their area – perhaps not quite at Manji’s heady levels – but in reality few councils are going to get that outcome. Ultimately population forecasting and subsequent planning must be firmly tethered to socio-economic and demographic evidence.
One of the factors that could change everything for ChCh, is this. The USA is an example of a nation with a significant number of cities that have had house price affordability problems and price bubble volatility. But the USA also has some cities that have stable, affordable house prices. The annual Demographia Reports have the data. The reason for the price stability is that they freely allow abundant rural land to be developed for housing (with private sector involvement in installing insfrastructure). There is enough land that the process is competitive – no price gouging by land bankers.
Some of the affordable cities in the USA are growing very rapidly with people and businesses relocating simply because those cities are affordable and other places are not. Some people sell a house for $1 million in a city like Los Angeles, and move to a city like Houston and get one just as good for $200,000. The difference is quite a lot of spare cash to be injected into Houston’s local economy.
Raf Manji is one of those who has accepted the logical argument from the housing policy expert Hugh Pavletich, that there would be major potential for Christchurch to position itself in this way, and grab massive amounts of growth from insanely-unaffordable Auckland.
I agree with Phil.
Absolutely it is more than possible for Chch to grow to this level. Unlike Australia, NZ does not rely on mining to create National wealth. There are hundreds of other industries that NZ is already a strong player in (such as software development and sustainable energy). Population growth and can be delivered by investment in these industries in an area that can still deliver on lifestyle.
The growth in Chch after the quakes was phenomenal considering the extent to which the critical infrastructure was destroyed. So long at Chch keeps up with global trends, gets rid of the “poppy slashers”, supports small business to grow and removes barriers such as transport limitations (ie ensure public transport is a key feature of all town planning decisions), the growth potential for Chch is unlimited!
Thanks for the comments!
Certainly the potential for growth in Greater Canterbury (Christchurch City, Waimakariri and Selwyn) will not be constrained by land availability. The same can be said for many areas in New Zealand … Invercargill, Palmerston North/Manawatu, or just down the road from Christchurch the mighty Timaru (my home town!).
But there needs to be more incentive to attract significant internal migration numbers (say from Auckland as suggested). The opportunities in the construction industry as the Christchurch rebuild continues are an example at the moment. Construction dominates growth in industry of employment figures in Greater Christchurch. How long the rebuild adds heat to the Christchurch economy remains to be seen, but I guess we will all be watching to see what industries step in behind that growth
As to the relative affordability of Christchurch, the NZHerald have a cracking infographic series which tracks Home Affordability versus Income across New Zealand. While Auckland stands out on its own, Greater Christchurch and Canterbury are unfortunately not so far behind – the infographic showing Canterbury affordability not nearly as attractive as Southland or the Manawatu/Wanganui region.
Go to http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10881119
It is fascinating to track through the changes since 2000.