Industry facts

Straterra’s role is to provide cross sector representation for the entire natural resources industry and related bodies and to obtain maximum social and economic benefits for all New Zealanders without compromising our country’s environmental values.

New Zealand’s natural resources industry includes:

• Coal, gold, irons, and industrial minerals. New Zealand’s main mineral exports earning more than $700 million per year. This includes 2.7 million tonnes of coal with a value of about $300 million.

• Oil valued at around $2 billion per year. Experts believe our oil self sufficiency could be boosted from about 18 per cent to 60 percent if obstacles to exploration were removed and more incentives provided.

• Natural gas production is worth about $1,000 million per year and accounts for more than 20 per cent of domestic primary energy supply.

• Metal resource values are estimated as high as $200 billion with potential for new discovery of high value minerals including platinum and gold.

• Non metallic minerals range from clay to pumice and silica sand. Worth around $40 million per year for export and industry use.

• Aggregates worth around $500 million per year are used in infrastructure development, industry and farming. We are one of the world’s most aggregate hungry nations but some councils exclude mining and quarrying from their district plans forcing production away from main centres. Transporting aggregates by road can double costs every 30km.

• Geothermal energy. New Zealand once led the world in geothermal expertise and this is again emerging as an important contender in commercial and sustainable energy developments.

• Coal Seam Gas (CSG) is a natural methane gas occurring naturally in deep coal seams. Experts suggest it could potentially supply five to 10 per cent of New Zealand’s gas supply.