In a recent report, I found that Central Otago District gained 306 Aucklanders in net terms over the four years to June 2017.
These Auckland migrants were the key contributor to Central Otago District’s total net regional gain of 969 people over the four-year period.
The table at the end of this article shows which parts of New Zealand these migration gains have come from. Behind Auckland, there were also substantial gains to Central Otago’s population from people moving out of Queenstown Lakes, a trend that has accelerated as housing in Queenstown and Wānaka became increasingly unaffordable and out-of-reach for many households. Over the four years to 2017, Central Otago had a net regional gain of 198 people from Queenstown Lakes.
Central Otago has also experienced relatively significant gains of regional migrants from nearby Invercargill, Clutha, and Southland District.
Of surprise, is that the data also showed gains from provincial economies in the lower North Island, including Masterton and Manawatu.
You may ask where this data comes from?
The data used to generate this insight ultimately comes from a large administrative dataset, called IDI, that links several government sources into a centralised database about people and households. By observing changes in residential address in this database, it is possible to estimate migration internally within New Zealand.
The data in IDI has been used by Statistics New Zealand to patch up Census 2018.
