New Zealand's weak productivity growth and insufficient business investment remain longstanding economic challenges. Businesses need modern machinery, technology and equipment to increase output, reduce costs, and compete internationally.
New Zealand First is the only party committed to doubling the New Zealand Economy by 2050, and in order to do that we must have policies focused on lifting productivity and gross domestic product.
The Government introduced Investment Boost in Budget 2025, allowing businesses to deduct 20% of the cost of eligible new investment assets upfront, followed by normal depreciation on the remaining 80%. The scheme applies to qualifying assets acquired or brought into use from 22 May 2025.
The current scheme is a depreciation uplift across all depreciable property. New Zealand First is supportive of targeted new plant, machinery, and equipment with high productivity returns.
Industrial machinery and equipment require substantial upfront capital over long timeframes. This means that large upfront capital outlay is required before equipment is operational and that such equipment typically has long payback periods.
International evidence clearly demonstrates that front-loaded depreciation for machinery and equipment accelerates capital investment, lifts productivity, and delivers measurable increases in GDP. Like-minded economies already have such policies in play and we need to ensure that our economy is competitive.
- NZ First will lift productivity by introducing a targeted accelerated depreciation rate of 50% in the first year for new plant, machinery and equipment for the manufacturing sector and targeted export sectors.
- The policy is not an expansion to the existing Investment Boost, but increases the first year depreciation rate only on new plant, machinery, and equipment, and only for businesses in the manufacturing and targeted export sectors such as primary production - mining, aquaculture, forestry, farming, and fishing.
New Zealand First backs our manufacturing sector and value-added export sectors and this policy is targeted to those sectors. Manufacturers across New Zealand and Primary industry production such as farming, fishing, aquaculture, horticulture, and mining will benefit from this policy.
This targeted expansion to investment boost complements other New Zealand First economic policies such as reducing the Company tax rate for SMEs from 28% to 20%, the establishment of a Temasek-model $100 billion New Zealand Future Fund, driving the cost of energy down by splitting the gentailers, target tax incentives for international investment into nationally significant infrastructure, incentivising value added dairy manufacturing, establishing a Special Economic Zone at Marsden Point, returning 50% of mining royalties back to their regions, and backing a New Zealand Owned Bank capable of competing with foreign owned banks.
