{"id":183886,"date":"2025-12-14T22:09:05","date_gmt":"2025-12-14T22:09:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/183886\/"},"modified":"2025-12-14T22:09:05","modified_gmt":"2025-12-14T22:09:05","slug":"northland-business-numbers-hit-record-high-but-unemployment-still-rising","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/183886\/","title":{"rendered":"Northland business numbers hit record high but unemployment still rising"},"content":{"rendered":"

The majority of businesses, at 48%, were in Whang\u0101rei<\/a>, while 35% were in the Far North and 17% in Kaipara, where the population is smaller.<\/p>\n

Construction<\/a> has led growth over the past decade, with finance and tech now rising.<\/p>\n

Mining and wholesale trade have shrunk, mirroring a nationwide trend.<\/p>\n

The council update said dairy and horticulture were driving Northland\u2019s growth, with record productivity and strong returns.<\/p>\n

\u201cAcross the board, producers dealt with changing markets, variable weather, and shifting consumer demand \u2013 highlighting resilience as well as ongoing structural issues,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n

\u201cDairy farmers had their best season yet for productivity and enjoyed a sharp lift in payout prices, boosting income across the sector.\u201d<\/p>\n

Northland\u2019s dairy sector produced 77 million kilograms of milk solids in the 2024\/25 season, up 10% on the previous year.<\/p>\n

Kiwifruit bounced back from last year\u2019s weather-hit season with a record crop.<\/p>\n

Northland growers delivered a record harvest of 6.75 million trays in 2024\/25, up 57% on the year before.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe rebound was driven by a return to average tray-per-hectare yields after the poor 2023\/24 season, which was affected by weak pollination and adverse weather,\u201d the council said.<\/p>\n

\"KiwifruitKiwifruit bounced back in Northland with a record crop. Photo \/ NZME<\/p>\n

Northland\u2019s avocado sector experienced a major surge, too. About 1.44 million trays of fruit were exported, marking a 175% increase from the previous season\u2019s 525,000 trays.<\/p>\n

The growth was driven primarily by productivity gains rather than land expansion, according to the report.<\/p>\n

\u201cNorthland now accounts for 43% of New Zealand\u2019s avocado-producing area, up from 36% a decade ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

Forestry remains under pressure from lower harvest volumes and softer revenue despite more land covered in trees.<\/p>\n

Harvest volumes were down 8% on last year and 40% below the 2015\/16 peak.<\/p>\n

The region\u2019s share of the national harvest has halved over a decade, falling to 7.9%.<\/p>\n

The lower volumes combined with softer log prices \u2013 averaging $131\/m\u00b3 \u2013 meant Northland forest owners\u2019 earnings were down 6% to about $340 million.<\/p>\n

The council provided an economist\u2019s take on the region\u2019s situation: \u201cNorthland has bounced back since the Global Financial Crisis and now has more businesses than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

While business was booming, jobs told a different story<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201c … Many industries are losing workers even as businesses grow. This could be because of technology and changes in how work is done.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Northland'sNorthland’s unemployment rate topped the country’s for the June quarter of this year. Photo \/ 123rf<\/p>\n

In Northland, unemployment rose from 5.4% last year to 6% this year.<\/p>\n

As of June, the region had the highest unemployment rate in the country \u2013 the first time since pre-Covid days.<\/p>\n

Contributing factors were a drop in employment of about 2200 people earlier this year and a rise in jobseekers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ministry of Social Development figures showed that in the June quarter, about 11.3% of Northland\u2019s working-age population received Jobseeker Support \u2013 the highest regional rate in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Limiting Northland\u2019s workforce size was the fact that the region has the country\u2019s highest dependency ratio, because 41% of its 201,100 residents are under 15 or over 65.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis means there are 71 dependants for every 100 working-age people, compared with 54 nationally,\u201d the council said.<\/p>\n

NorthChamber chief executive Leah McKerrow said most businesses had found this year difficult.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has been a tough couple of years … But there is optimism that it is starting to change.\u201d<\/p>\n

McKerrow pointed to the 55% increase in entries into the Northland Business Awards<\/a> as a sign the tide may be turning.<\/p>\n

The reasons for that jump may be people having more time on their hands, or that businesses were really striving to find the space that gives them the edge, she said.<\/p>\n

\"NorthChamberNorthChamber chief executive Leah McKerrow. Photo \/ Denise Piper<\/p>\n

While the increase in registered businesses was great, McKerrow wondered if many of them were one-person businesses and the fallout from job losses.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have quite senior people starting to decide, well, I\u2019ll start up my own business.\u201d<\/p>\n

McKerrow\u2019s thoughts came from the growth in Northland\u2019s finance and tech sector, which suggested to her that that might be the case.<\/p>\n

The vast majority of businesses in Northland had fewer than 10 employees. Only 15 on NorthChamber\u2019s records had more than 50 staff.<\/p>\n

McKerrow said they were likely to be related to health, central or local government.<\/p>\n

In terms of more jobs, business confidence and whether businesses felt next year would be better than the last was key.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we feel more confident, we\u2019re then likely to make plans for growth and act on them,\u201d McKerrow said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we start doing that, that in turn puts more money into the economy, which builds confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

McKerrow said business confidence was currently up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI honestly think we are in an exciting time … We\u2019re on a bit of a cusp. And what that means is that the more we work together, the better.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The majority of businesses, at 48%, were in Whang\u0101rei, while 35% were in the Far North and 17%…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":183887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,10166,3013,5343,13982,219,2959,3594,111,139,1067,4061,3591,69,1974,15265,801,6100,241,6123],"class_list":["post-183886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-businesses","tag-but","tag-climb","tag-continues","tag-economy","tag-high","tag-hit","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-northland","tag-number","tag-numbers","tag-nz","tag-record","tag-registered","tag-rising","tag-still","tag-unemployment","tag-while"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}