Business Immigration: The Evaluation of the 1999 Business Immigration Policy

Author: NZ Immigration Service

The strengths of the policy were identified as well as areas that could be improved. The 1999 business immigration policy introduced flexible policies and practices in order to make New Zealand a more attractive destination for business migrants. Three business residence categories were established, with each category targeting specific segments of the business migrant market. These were the Entrepreneur Category, the Investor Category, the Employees of Relocating Businesses Category and a new temporary category the Long Term Business Visa (LTBV).

A variety of quantitative and qualitative research methods were employed in the evaluation and these included analyses of immigration databases and application files, interviews with informants, and a small survey of Investor and LTBV principal applicants. The primary limitation was that the survey of business migrants provided qualitative information and therefore those findings should be seen as indicative.

The policy has successfully increased the number of business migrants entering New Zealand, and they arrived with an array of business related skills. For example, LTBV principal applicants had an average of 10.41 years business experience. Militating against the business experience being brought was evidence that a significant minority of Investor Category principal applicants were absent from the country for six months or more. On the whole, the major flows of business migrants came from countries with dissimilar cultures to New Zealand and from a non-English speaking background.

Strengths of the policy included that it was attracting high numbers of business migrants with prior business experience, attracting a high level of investment money, and the numbers of new businesses established with additional jobs created. In regard to numbers, the policy was more successful than its predecessors. A wide variety of businesses were established through the various policies. The Accommodation, Cafés and Restaurants industry grouping was the largest. There was also, however, ample evidence that businesses were being established in a variety of industry categories and business types.

Militating against the sums being invested was evidence from the file study that Investor migrants were placing their money into a passive investment, that is, a savings account with a trading bank. This finding is similar to the situation with the 1991 Business Investment Category where most of the migrants were investing passively. Auckland was the major recipient of the businesses either established or to be established by migrants across all the categories.

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