Managing our fresh water: what are the options?

Presentation at NZIER’s 60th anniversary event,14 November 2018.

NZIER has had a long-standing interest in the water quality debate (see for example our public good piece in 2014, “Water management in New Zealand: A road map for understanding water value” – NZIER Public Discussion Paper 2014/01). One of the issues we wanted to further understand was the preferences of New Zealanders in 2018.

The aim of this initial piece of work was to illustrate the choices we might have to make on fresh water policy. To do this we carried out a survey in October 2018 using 1,000 minds decision-making software.

The responses give us a window into how Kiwis view fresh water. This though is only a partial picture of Kiwi preferences as responses do not specifically include Māori and those without access to the internet.