Education Summit

Monday 13 October 2003

Good afternoon....it's great to see such a good turnout, and especially encouraging to see at least some Australians not glued to rugby to the point where they can't pay us a visit. Given that Adelaide is one of our sister cities both in practical and emotional terms it is good to see that the main international keynote is coming from the experience of Education Adelaide.

It was suggested today that I make my subject and speech title: "The importance of the international education industry to Canterbury. ''I won't. I think a great start point for reality based talks would be to turn that title upside down. If we instead asked ourselves about " the importance of Canterbury to the
International education industry" we might all be starting from a more realistic point. The answer would be "not very much at all.''

We all like to prance and preen about our issues in Canterbury and elsewhere. The blunt fact is that in the context of the global market we are competing in we are hardly on the radar. We need to try and keep that reality in our minds at all times. This reality is our challenge. How do we get on the radar screen? My answer is “in a planned and organised way”.

Christchurch and Canterbury are unusual parts of New Zealand in that we are primarily traders on the global markets. We are outward facing to an extent few other significant New Zealand areas come close to matching. We are first in and out of economic changes that reflect the greater global economy.
We are, if you like the warning lights on the dashboard of the New Zealand economy, for good and for bad changes in the performance of our trade engines.

Christchurch’s high tech statistics

NZ$792m in combined revenues for 100 IT and electronics industries in 2002-2003-10-13 NZ$481m in export earnings
3,400 employees
30% bigger than Auckland
NZ$200,000 per employee vs national average of NZ$80,000
Direct employment to treble over next 4 years
Output rising to $1,48b.

Some of the National MP's here today will be able to take pleasure when I say next that I do not think our media always reflects our economic conditions accurately and fairly. It was a complaint I have heard them say in Government, it is a complaint that after some terms in local government I am starting to voice myself. The economic reality for Canterbury is that according to the last National Bank survey we were in our eighth unbroken quarter of economic growth.

They had no way of measuring that because it had not happened before. It was a record. It put Canterbury as a region first equal in New Zealand for economic growth. Economically Canterbury is making hay while the economic sun shines. The true test of management lies ahead and now in making sure we do as well as we can to ensure our future harvests are also bountiful, profitable and fair. I mention fairness not just because every old liberal speech likes a sprinkling of it in the mix.

I mention it because there is a moral component to prosperity. One of the best performers in the global equity markets during the recent turbulence were the ethically managed funds. That is funds that only invest in concerns that take steps not to exploit the environment, their staff or their shareholders. They actually do better because they are more ethically based.

I believe that this spirit of fairness as an investment factor needs to be applied to how we carry on with the international education industry in the future. The start-up phase and hopefully the cash cow harvesting attitudes that went with it in some cases are hopefully now generally behind us. We really need to think hard about the morality of this industry.

We are effectively being entrusted by people far way with both the education and the care of their children. That is a major level of trust and expectation. (Mention story of importance of safety when our children are entrusted into other hands when overseas – talk about attending funeral of young girl from Beijing and her father’s speech.) I think we must be willing to look at it, as a question of how well the care we offer stacks up against that we would wish for our own children.

I would hope that everyone here today would hear that plea and keep it in mind. I will refer later to safety and I would like you to play your part in this. I also believe we must get over and beyond this sad little war of ideology that is waged behind the scenes in the education system. China's late leader, Chairman Deng, let the capitalist genie out of the bottle when he said a few years ago that he did not care what colour the cat was, he just wanted it to catch mice. I think it was a good call to make.

It is another point I would like us to keep in mind. Our guests here for education are not overly interested in our politics, what they want is results. I think that is perfectly fair. We have identified the education industry as one of the key drivers for our local economy in the near and long term. I think it is fair to say that we have had a period of explosive growth followed by a very predictable shakeout as the industry moves into a more mature phase.

How we manage that phase is going to prove crucial to building on the gains of recent years.

Growth Rate over last 5 years

1998 6%
1999 96%
2000 14%
2001 19%
2002 126%

Like most of the problems that face Canterbury at present the problems of the education industry are those of growth. Keeping it, managing it and enhancing it in future. Now although we all know and respect the grim truth that lies behind the old saying about lies, lies and damn statistics we also know they can be useful for informed discussion. So here we go for Canterbury on the education front. First for the journalists who are grumpy about missing lunch here is the economic benefit figure.

Last year the international education industry was responsible for $202 million in fees and accommodation alone. We had one fifth of New Zealand’s international students based here. Of the total 15,584 students studying here they were at the following places:

Primary 505
Intermediate 113
Secondary 1,705
Universities 1,709
Polytechnics 689
College of Education 113
English Language 10,500
Private tertiary 250

It is also worthwhile in the wake of the recent speculation about growing new markets to look at the breakdown of where these students came from.

92.1 per cent came from Asia;
3.2 per cent from the Pacific islands;
2.1 per cent from Europe;
2.0 per cent from Central and South America; and
0.3 per cent from North America

As an accountant that leads me to conclude that we have a long way to go before our almost complete dependency of Asian students shows any change at all. Maybe what we do need to do at this stage is become more vocal about the huge economic benefits international education provides for our economy.
There is also the huge social dividends that come from providing our international students with a positive experience of our country.

I was in Hiroshima and Nagasaki recently for the atom bomb ceremonies. I saw and heard from some of the survivors just how hideous the price is when people and nations stop seeing each other as people and take to the path of war. We can have no prosperity without peace, and peace is at peril if prosperity becomes too far away at any time. There are more than just dollars at stake with how we handle international education. Speak about experience of visiting Colombo Plan students in Malaysia.

As I said before it is one of the key industries I and other local leaders have marked out as crucial building blocks if we are to aspire to a prosperous and sustainable economic future. As a city we are about to engage in focusing on this becoming a Prosperous City.

We have 4 strands of focus:

Attracting growth magnets;
Mayors Taskforce for Jobs;
Great place to do business and live; and
The Learning City.

Education features under 2 planks. Firstly, under “Attracting Growth Magnets”. We will be putting special focus on 5 sectors where we have comparative advantage:

Food and fibre production;
I.T.;
Manufacturing;
Tourism, and
Education.

Over the next few months we will be working hard to develop a strategic approach to consolidate our educational excellence and to encourage its growth. You will have to play a part in this. I cannot say how frustrating I find it to go to a city in another country to hear that several of our tertiary institutions have been to visit them, separately, in the recent past.

We must be strategic when developing international markets and we probably should be planning this together. I hope that with our maturing market we will be rediscovering the need to plan together. I would urge both public and private providers of education to work together to develop new markets together using each other’s contacts. There are enough students for everybody.

I was interested to hear recently about how Auckland has been strategic on which cities in Asia it targets to market its international education. It’s an interesting model.

The second plank on our Prosperous City plan, which features education, is the “Learning City”. We must become focused at being “Christchurch – the Global Learning City”.

Next week I travel to Brisbane to attend a conference of Pacific Rim cities. We can learn from each other and we have much to add to the mix. By linking our educational institutions and having an appropriate and safe support structure we will have a good story to tell.

I said earlier I would return to safety. Under the new Local Government Act we have new responsibilities. One of the fundamental planks is for us to ensure that this is a safe city.

This comes in many forms. We will have to work closely with Central Government Agencies to achieve high levels of safety. We will have to work hard as a Council to do our bit with safe roads and well lit streets etc. Safety is also protecting those precious lives of other people’s children that we have been entrusted to educate. You sector will have to work hard to achieve this. Safe housing, good support to our overseas guests in all the forms that takes and a place we can proudly stand up in the international arena and say “your child is safe here”.

Your sector has to do this bit – I know you’ve done a lot, but if we are to achieve the goal of the city of internationally recognised educational excellence we all have to lift our game.

So, in conclusion, you’ve all done a huge amount to get us to the point where your sector is one of the large engines of our local economy. Your sector is in a “consolidating industry” phase and, before your take off again we need to pay attention to some detailed planning, to set some goals which we all buy into and then all commit to promoting this marvellous South Pacific gem End.