PROJECTS

Economic analysis of resource management reforms, New Zealand

Client needs

The Ministry for the Environment required an urgent economic assessment of proposed reforms to New Zealand’s resource management system to inform Cabinet decisions on the new legislation replacing the Resource Management Act 1992.

How Castalia helped

The proposed reforms included only high-level details. Castalia worked closely, transparently, and collaboratively with the client, applying an evidence-based approach despite limited available data.

We assessed the likely impacts of the reforms, drawing on our prior work on the Resource Management Act and previous attempts at reforms in New Zealand.

Our team compared administrative and compliance costs under New Zealand’s current and proposed resource management systems and reviewed the literature on the existing system’s performance. We also analysed how the proposed reforms could affect environmental outcomes, infrastructure delivery, housing and urban development, and wider economic productivity.

The outcome of our work

Castalia’s analysis indicated that the reforms could generate a net economic benefit of about $14.5 billion in present value terms by reducing the administrative and compliance costs of the system by 45%.