NZME\u2019s Project Canterbury<\/a> business breakfast at One NZ Stadium, Luxon explained why he sees Christchurch as a shining example of New Zealand\u2019s future.<\/p>\nHowever, Canterbury isn\u2019t the only region that has climbed the ranks, with Taranaki delivering the biggest surprise, climbing to second place in the rankings after sitting near the bottom last quarter.<\/p>\n
Mundy said Taranaki recorded one of the \u201ccountry\u2019s strongest rebounds\u201d.<\/p>\n
Employment growth in Taranaki was among the strongest nationally, construction activity surged 47.1% year-on-year and new vehicle registrations increased 21.6%.<\/p>\n
\u201cTaranaki recorded one of the country\u2019s strongest rebounds, benefiting from strong dairy and meat sector performance, supported by the Fonterra capital return payout and favourable export conditions,\u201d Mundy said. <\/p>\n
\u201cThese strengths likely offset some weakness in the oil and gas sector.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Kim]()
Kim Mundy, ASB acting chief economist.<\/p>\n
There were also plenty of bright spots for Southland, with strong house price growth, a surge in new car registrations and solid retail sales growth underpinning their result of third place.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile housing markets remained subdued across much of New Zealand, Southland\u2019s housing market continued to show remarkable resilience, with annual growth in both house prices and house sales remaining the strongest in the country,\u201d Mundy said.<\/p>\n
Strong dairy and meat exports, with Fonterra\u2019s capital return payout, continued to support the regional economy.<\/p>\n
Retail sales rose around 7% over the past year, while new car registrations increased sharply.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe region\u2019s Achilles heel has been its softening labour market, with employment falling 2.9% annually,\u201d Mundy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, agriculture remains a significant contributor to the local economy and is currently performing strongly, helping offset some of the weakness in the jobs market.\u201d<\/p>\n
The City of Sails slipped down the rankings to sixth place, underperforming the national average across most indicators in ASB\u2019s Q2 Regional Economic Scoreboard.<\/p>\n
![\"Auckland]()
Auckland slipped down the rankings to sixth place in ASB’s Regional Economic Scoreboard.<\/p>\n
Despite new car registrations rising strongly, reflecting demand for electric vehicles, and building consents showing healthy growth, other regions recorded even stronger gains in these areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cAuckland\u2019s housing market remained a key drag on performance, with both house prices and sales down significantly on a year ago,\u201d Mundy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuyers continued to hold the upper hand as listings remained high and demand subdued.<\/p>\n
Mundy said while some sectors were bolstering Auckland, other factors created \u201congoing uncertainty\u201d for the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cPopulation growth and tourism are providing some support to the region, but Auckland\u2019s economy continues to contend with cost-of-living pressures, interest rates trending higher, a soft labour market and ongoing uncertainty,\u201d Mundy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile these challenges may weigh on activity in the near term, the region remains well positioned to benefit as economic conditions gradually improve.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite a slowing economy, New Zealand\u2019s export sector remained resilient in Q2.<\/p>\n
Export volumes rose 6.4% over the quarter and 10% on a year ago, while export prices increased 3.5%.<\/p>\n
Dairy, meat and wool all posted solid gains, helping offset the surge in import prices from the Middle East conflict.<\/p>\n
\u201cExports look set to remain a key source of support for the economy, underpinned by firm commodity prices and a weak New Zealand dollar,\u201d Mundy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor now, New Zealand\u2019s two-speed economy appears likely to persist.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mundy said the subdued economic backdrop is expected to continue, with Middle East tensions adding to uncertainty.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe expect further 25-basis-point hikes from the RBNZ [Reserve Bank] in October and December, taking the OCR [Official Cash Rate] to 3.25%,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHigher interest rates are likely to weigh on consumer spending and delay a broader housing market recovery. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhile the outlook remains data-dependent, inflation is expected to stay close to 4% through the rest of 2026 and labour market conditions are likely to remain soft.\u201d<\/p>\n
The ASB Regional Economic Scoreboard ratings are updated every three months and are based on 11 measures, including employment, construction, the retail trade and house prices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cHouseholds are spending, businesses are investing, the labour market remains resilient and strong dairy returns are providing an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":603645,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[74,25286,23486,138,8126,3311,543,10668,219,1138,3499,3339,78,6721,700,225,111,139,69,8467,8998,28228,71040,297395,5914,15216,23487,12975,8262,15412,18835,3010],"class_list":["post-603644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-after","tag-asb","tag-asbs","tag-business","tag-canterbury","tag-consumer","tag-driven","tag-economic","tag-economy","tag-firm","tag-growth","tag-housing","tag-in","tag-labour","tag-latest","tag-market","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-population","tag-position","tag-ranking","tag-reclaimed","tag-reclaims","tag-regional","tag-resilient","tag-scoreboard","tag-sector","tag-spending","tag-spot","tag-strong","tag-top"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603644","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=603644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/603645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=603644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=603644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=603644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}