The Great Kiwi Migration

Kiwi (the birds) don’t actually migrate, as far as I’m aware. In fact, I believe they do relatively little, but expose themselves to the western vermin of which they are now unfortunately prey. Alas, in this article at least, I am not referencing our feathered friends (or the fruit!), rather the Kiwi people and specifically their exit from our shores as restrictions fall. Apologies if you thought this is some groundbreaking ornithological study – that’s next month!

You may have heard multiple references to the above, “The Brain Drain”, “The Boomerang” etc. – call it what you want, but we’re all referencing the same thing; and that is that for the foreseeable future, there will be a higher rate of emigration than immigration of highly skilled workers on the shores of Aotearoa.

Kiwibank has predicted that there will be as many as 20,000 more people leaving Aotearoa this year than arriving and others are citing the greatest period of emigration since the Australian Mining boom of 2011. Just yesterday MBIE estimated around 50,000 NZ citizens will permanently move away this next year too. Now, this is not some snidey political article, although if you have a few hours, I will happily rant my thoughts on the short-sightedness and many failings of the inept Kris Faafoi and his team, who seem to have had a merry old time off during the pandemic, apparently twiddling their thumbs. The 60 odd thousand of us that have been here during the pandemic waiting with baited breath as to when they’ll reopen the Residency applications are glad that they’ve finally pulled their thumb out, but there are so many that were left behind and it all feels too little too late.

Now, this is not just an OE brain drain, it is something more. As living costs and house prices skyrocket (seemingly uncontrollably) in New Zealand, we have our friends over the ditch that live in relative comfort, with much higher wages and lower costs. And to those saying, “they’ll return, they always do”, well there are 650,000 Kiwi’s in Australia that haven’t. This movement, leaving a subsequent lack of talent builds the potential for NZ businesses to go down the path of suppressing output or just simply failing to keep up.

There are a few ways around this; learn from the pandemic and the situation we were forced into by Covid. Funnily enough, people can work remotely from anywhere! Who knew? Many of our clients are offering flexible working or ‘Work from anywhere’ schemes. There are obviously some jobs that don’t quite fit this mould, but I guarantee there’s many that do. I’ve even found a growing trend of Western US companies, from Silicon Valley and the like, enquiring about our services in NZ, rather than our offices in the US, as they want access to cheaper skilled labour within a similar time zone.

Canada, for instance, is aiming to welcome more than 430-450,000 Permanent Residents to its shores each year over the next few years, in an immigration plan designed to help fill skills gaps. They had a record year last year and seek to continue the trend.

So, what are we doing? Jacinda said last week that Immigration NZ would be prioritising working holiday visas for young travellers who have expressed an interest in coming to NZ. Whilst that helps the tourism operators, it doesn’t help the large skill gaps in Technology, Construction and Medicine.

We are now in a Global Talent War and should be doing everything we can to promote New Zealand to the world as at the top of its game. If others are looking to poach our people, we need to figure out a way to retain them, whilst also systematically attracting others to make the move to the bottom of the world to enjoy all this wonderful country has to offer. I say this as someone who has made the move and is very content with their decision.

NB. If my immigration officer is reading this, you’re doing a smashing job! But, please hurry up!