Doubling export growth

Déjà vu, anyone? In 2013, the National Government announced a plan to double exports in a decade. Primary sector export growth was targeted at $64 billion by 2025, and the current Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) forecast is $58 billion. It’s not quite double, but a solid 70 percent growth, a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.1 percent and $24 billion of new primary sector exports. 

During the same decade tech exports grew from $5.7 billion to a forecast $12 billion in 2025. That’s 112 percent growth over a decade, a CAGR of 8.3 percent and an additional $6.4 billion. But buried in those tech exports is software, from $233 million in 2013, it is growing at a 10 year CAGR of 24 percent.

So what is the next decade likely to bring? A doubling of exports means exports will need to grow to $190 billion in ten years. While tech is a smaller base compared to the entire primary sector, there is no way we can grow our economy to this level without tech exports. According to recent research by KiwiSaaS, the SaaS sector alone is forecast to create an additional $3 billion in exports. If you consider the role of tech in enabling our traditional export sectors to grow, it’s a no-brainer. 

So surely the Government has made an error stopping investment in the growth of agritech? Or am I missing something?

Meanwhile, I would like to acknowledge the excellent work of the Agritech Activator team at Callaghan Innovation. In collaboration with AgriTechNZ they have established a large, well connected and vibrant agritech community that is making a significant contribution to New Zealand exports.

In other news, currently there are multiple opportunities to be involved in our important work. Nominations for the NZTech Board close on Friday 12 July.

AgriTechNZ and BlockchainNZ are both seeking nominations for their respective Executive Councils.

Ngā mihi 
Graeme Muller
CEO, NZTech

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