The Emissions Reduction Plan 2 (ERP2) delineates Aotearoa New Zealand’s strategy to attain its emissions reduction objectives for the 2026-2030 period, alongside setting a path towards achieving long-term emissions reduction objectives. ERP2 aims to reduce annual average emissions from 72.5 MtCO2e to 61 MtCO2e. The Ministry for the Environment (MfE) engaged Principal Economics Limited, the Centre of Policy Studies, and Infometrics Limited to evaluate the comprehensive impact of the proposed policies. This includes:

• Assessing the comprehensive economic repercussions of emissions mitigation policy packages within ERP2.

• Estimating and understanding of secondary or indirect consequences.

• Carrying out distributional analysis of these ramifications.

The critical policies investigated in our report include:

• Increasing renewable energy through Electrify NZ

• Targeting 10,000 public EV chargers

• Lowering agricultural emissions

• Investing in resource recovery

• Improving public transport

• Investigating carbon capture, utilisation and storage.

Cite this article

Torshizian E, Adams P, Stroombergen A. 2024. Economic Impact of New Zealand’s Second Emissions Reduction Plan. Report to Ministry for the Environment by Principal Economics Limited in collaboration with the Centre for Policy Studies and Infometrics Limited.

Despite being one of the national priorities, there are still large gaps and no consensus from the literature on what drives house price growth and the interaction between major drivers that underpin house price growth. In our housing affordability knowledge hub, we provide:

• an independent review of the factors of house price growth (HPG) in New Zealand
• a range of descriptive statistics of the HPG and its drivers over the last fifty years.

Our review includes both the academic and grey literature. We provide a list of suggested future studies to improve our understanding of the factors of HPG in New Zealand.

Cite this article.

Principal Economics. (2021). Drivers of House Price Growth Knowledge Hub. Retrieved from Drivers of House Price Growth – Principal Economics.

Transportation decisions can have large and varied impacts on travellers and their communities. It’s important to measure these effects and consider their impact on various groups when planning projects.

Waka Kotahi uses a framework to decide which transport projects and programmes to pursue. The economic business case must contain a cost–benefit analysis (CBA). CBAs assess the economics of a proposal by valuing (monetising) the costs and benefits to all members of society. However, CBAs sum across a wide range of people and don’t calculate inequities between groups or individuals, or who ultimately benefits from the project.

Transport equity discussions focus on social justice. Equity impact analysis helps policymakers to make good decisions for a wide range of people. Distributional impact analysis needs to be complemented with wider investment and planning considerations. This includes any comprehensive policy framework that accounts for the overlapping effects of transport, housing and taxing policies.

Cite this article

Torshizian, E., Byett, A., Isack, E., Fehling, A., & Maralani M. (2022). Incorporating distributional impacts in the cost–benefit appraisal framework (Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency research report 700).

The Ministry for the Environment (MfE) appointed Principal Economics to review the Housing and Business Development Capacity Assessments HBAs). Our review included all councils’ HBAs, except for Rotorua and Wellington, which were not available at the time of this review. The focus of our review was on the requirements of the National Policy Statement on Urban Development 2020 (NPS-UD 2020). The outcome of our review indicates the areas of improvement for the next round of HBAs both for the councils and for the MfE and HUD (the ministries).

Reviews that have been published online can be found below:

• Dunedin – Otago Regional Council and Dunedin City Council.
• Futureproof – Waikato Regional Council, Hamilton City Council, Waikato District Council and Waipa District Council.
• Tasman – Tasman District Council.