July 11, 2023
Collaboration key to Māori infrastructure business
Collaboration could be the key to getting more Māori firms active in the infrastructure sector.
A new report for Te Puni Kokiri, part of a series on the Māori potential in various industries, highlights a shortfall of Māori investment.
Economic consultant Richard Jefferies, who commissioned the report for the Māori Development Ministry, says building roads, hospitals and other projects that come under the category of infrastructure means having a lot of equipment and a well-trained workforce.
More can be done to support the small and medium Māori firms which are already in the space to help them grow.
“Collaboration is going to be the name of the game. These are big contracts often and so individual mall to medium sized companies won’t really get there so that means working a lot more with what they call the tier one contractors, usually the big companies that pick up the master contracts and then tend to work with a whole lot of subcontractors,” Mr Jefferies says.
He says the Ministry of Social Development is trying to put together a series of clusters, and Waka Kotahi is also looking to work more closely with mana whenua and Māori small and medium enterprises on some of its roading projects.