Asset level raised to $10M

Press, 21 July 1989, Page 2

Asset level raised to $10M

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in

Wellington

The Government plans to raise the minimum level at which the Overseas Investment Commission is required to, consider applications to buy New Zealand-owned assets from $2 million to $lO million. But the Minister of Finance, Mr Caygill, told Parliament yesterday there would be three exceptions to this. The new threshold would not apply to commercial fishing, broadcasting (radio and television) or agriculture. Having a $lO million threshold for other areas bought New Zealand into line with Australia, he said.

Earlier in the week, Mr Caygill had discussed in some detail Government attitudes to foreign ownership of farmland when he spoke to the annual conference of Federated Farmers. “I find it difficult to

make an economic case, for protecting farmland from foreign ownership,” he said.

Protecting farmland from foreign investment seemed like using import licensing to protect domestic investment in manufacturing. “Only in farming, unlike manufacturing, confining the market to domestic players keeps prices down rather than up,” Mr Caygill said. Clearly, in spite of New Zealand’s tradition of being an importer of foreign capital, it had not ended up being controlled by overseas investors. The basis for protecting farmland, along with commercial fishing and broadcasting, from foreign investment was social rather than economic, he said.

All three are areas where the Government had felt the country would be uncomfortable with overseas investment.