Innovation schemes show NZ still prepared to benefit from immigration

New Zealanders pride themselves in their ideas and innovation – we call it our No. 8 wire mentality.

Throw us a problem and we'll find a way to sort it.

Challenge us to find a better way to achieve something and we'll do that, too. It's one of the things we're known around the world for.

In that context, the Wellington region is a hot-bed of innovation.

Our high-tech companies are world leaders in areas from computer games, apps, and whizzy accounting systems, to online tools, telecommunications and system design.

Our scientists are at the forefront of drug development and medical diagnostics.

And our film sector has achieved animation innovation we can only marvel at.

Through all this, our companies are always prepared to take their ideas to the world when they need help to take them to the next step. 

Hardly surprising, then, that one of the most exciting developments of recent years is a move in the other direction – encouraging the world's best to come here to contribute to our search for further world-leading innovation. 

I'm talking about an initiative the like of which I suspect there are few that exist anywhere else.  

The Edmund Hillary Fellowship (EHF) is a programme that each year gives 100 entrepreneurs, investors and start-up teams a platform to incubate global impact ventures from New Zealand and contribute to our innovation scene.

It's run in conjunction with Immigration NZ's new Global Impact Visa. EHF will deliver the attraction, selection and integration programme, and Immigration NZ will handle the visas, which allow innovators to work here for three years and eligibility for residency. 

The innovators will be joined each year by 20 Kiwi entrepreneurs and investors, who will participate in workshops, skill-sharing sessions, and other learning opportunities.

Importantly, the innovators can work anywhere in New Zealand that works for them.

The initiative is looking not just for those who want to invest money, but also those with industry experience who want to work alongside innovators, investing their time as well.

So far, the response has been inspiring. Within weeks of advertising, EHF had received more than 350 expressions of interest.

Those at the launch in Wellington last week were, I'm sure, impressed by what they heard.

In particular, it was the tone set by Somalian-born Harvard-educated chief executive Yoseph Ayele, who enthused over New Zealand as a great environment to live and work in, with transparent government and a people with a great attitude.

When you hear people who are lately to our shores talk like that, you have a feeling this initiative is going places.

It's about New Zealand going out to the world and saying we want the brightest to come here and we will help them do what they do best. 

Bringing in these people and spreading them around the country is a new way of doing things, and I'm convinced it will have a halo effect.

Similarly, the initiative announced this week by Wellington Regional Development Agency to fly in overseas IT professionals to match them to prospective employers is trying something new and is to be applauded.

I'm told that by placing one in three, this initiative will make back the total investment, which isn't too bad a return. 

Initiatives like these show New Zealand is prepared to continue to look outward to benefit from immigrants who are prepared to contribute to our values, our land, our transparency, and the way we do things.

At a time when there's a great deal of debate about immigration, and when others are putting up barriers, it's great to see we continue to boldly open ours in the name of progress. Source: stuff