While the new Minister
of Economic Development sends his apologies at being unable to speak at this
Conference, I am delighted to present on his behalf. The Ministry of Economic
Development is not only responsible for managing the Crown mineral estate, but
also for developing initiatives and policies to promote regional economic
development and for managing the Government's broader economic development
strategy. I'd like to talk to you today about the critical links that need to
exist between these three areas.

I am
going to start with a question for all of you. What do these towns have in
common?

Waiuku,

Thames,

New Plymouth,

Nelson,

Greymouth,

Arrowtown,

Reefton,

Palmerston, and

Dunedin.

The
answer is minerals. These towns were nearly all founded on the back of minerals
and mining. In the case of Greymouth it was gold that brought the people to the
mouth of the Grey
River and it is coal that
sustains the town.

In
1870 the town of Shortland had 20 000 people, 90
hotels and was twice the size of Auckland. We now know Shortland as Thames, and
of course Auckland is considerably larger. One wonders
whether the good folk of Shortland suffered from traffic jams' with 90 pubs to
navigate between. Gold mining in the Aorere River near Collingwood led early
entrepreneurs to develop the land surrounding Nelson as a food basket to sustain
the mining population. Nelson is still thriving on this legacy today. The town
of Palmerston
was founded in 1862 as a stopping point for gold miners heading into central
Otago. The gold rush made Dunedin New Zealand's
first highly industrialised city. Reefton on the West Coast was the first town
in New Zealand to have electric lights and in the recent past we were wondering
who'd be left to turn them off. New Plymouth, and Waiuku are still known as energy
and mining centres.

By
contrast once thriving towns like Capleston, Canvastown and Blackball are just
names on a map now, and at the extreme you have places like Waiuta which has
been reclaimed by the West Coast forest. Queenstown was built off the back of
the gold rush, but by 1900 with the gold gone, only 190 people lived there yet
Queenstown has managed to rebuild itself thanks to some other stunning natural
assets. These examples help illustrate three key points that I am sure will each
be extensively linked with our minerals and mining industries. First, NZ's
development and that of its regions has been, and continues to be, inextricably
linked with our minerals and mining industries.

Second, things change.
Sectors, regions and countries must continually adapt and improve if the are to
avoid the fate of the Waiutas of this world. And third, the development
challenges faced by NZ and its mining industry in the 21st century are vastly
more complex than in the past. Governments and industry alike must balance and
respond to a range of domestic and international environmental, cultural,
economic and other interests and considerations. If you thought of your industry
as just digging holes in the ground' then you may as well simply stick your
head in one!