Category Archives: BLOG

  • September 6, 2016
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Good decisions, better chances

Indian community blames NZ authorities, schools for student deportations

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Indian community blames NZ authorities, schools for student deportations

One hundred and fifty Indian students studying in New Zealand face deportation because the immigration agent they used in India committed fraud. Nine of them spoke to Checkpoint today.

The Indian High Commissioner and others have blamed the authorities and tertiary institutions for not cracking down on rogue education agents.

A protest will be held on Saturday outside an Auckland National MP’s office to protest the deportation of dozens of Indian students whose visas have been cancelled because of false documentation.

The Unite union, which is backing the students – many of whom are fast-food workers – said it understood Immigration New Zealand had been given the names of the agents, but it had not changed the situation

He said the number of Indian students here had surged in the last two years, and that the Government had made it easier for them to work here, knowing that suited certain low-wage industries.

Indian High Commissioner Sanjiv Kohli said he had already spoken to New Zealand authorities about student visa concerns

Although he had not been approached about the current situation, he said the onus lay entirely with the educational institutions which worked with the agents.

It was “grossly unfair” to target students who had already started and invested heavily in their studies.

“Action , if any, has to be against the concerned institutions, their agents and responsibility fixed on those who failed to supervise the process and cleared the visas on the basis of documents presented.

“You cannot be advertising yourself as world-class teaching institutions, admit international students, charge them huge fees and then say Sorry, the visas were given without a proper scrutiny of the documents, or that the institution which has admitted you does not meet necessary standards.

“Why were they licensed and allowed to admit international students in the first instance?”

Prakash Biradar, secretary of the New Zealand Indian Central Association, said it was a real concern.

“If the Government has approved, then it is government’s responsibility.”

But Steven Joyce, the minister responsible for international education, sheeted the responsibility back to the institutions.

“It’s actually the responsibility of the provider to ensure that they know who their agents are and that their agents are acting ethically and legally.”

Immigration New Zealand had been tightening up on student visas and about 40 per cent of student visa applications from India were currently being turned down.

A new code of practice had also come into force in July which meant education providers would have their right to bring in students revoked if their agents misbehaved, he said.

Education New Zealand, the body which promotes international education in New Zealand, said all students had to personally sign a declaration that the details in their application were true, regardless of the agent.

About 60 per cent of the 125,000 international students in New Zealand had used education agents, a spokesperson Carole van Grondelle said.

ENZ ran a “recognised agent” programme and education providers had a code of pastoral care.

It was also working with Immigration New Zealand and NZQA to ensure New Zealand institutions had better information about agents and felt that was a better approach than, say, a blacklist.

The students will protest outside the offices of National MP Parmjeet Parmar.

– Stuff

  • July 19, 2016
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Education

Fears of backlash by Indian education agents

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Fears of backlash by Indian education agents

Tertiary insitutions are worried NZ’s lucrative multi-million-dollar education trade with India will be endangered by accusations of fraud and high visa refusal rates. They say the education agents who send the vast majority of Indian students to this country are feeling angry and betrayed and could start sending students to other countries.

More on fraud, fees and student visas
Immigration New Zealand is turning down nearly half the would-be-students applying to study in New Zealand from India, and says it has found fraud in study visa applications from many Indian education agents, some of whom are acting with corrupt bank managers.

But an email from an Indian agent sent to RNZ indicated some agents are feeling betrayed.

It said agents had promoted New Zealand and helped it develop as an education destination “but now Immigration [NZ] is bringing up a big question towards our credibility of being fraudulent and misleading, which is untrue”.

The email said Indian students had better English than those from many other countries that sent students to New Zealand, but those countries were treated better than India.

It said a list of agents whose clients’ study visa applications included fraudulent documents was being used to tarnish their image.

Queens Academic Group chief executive Clare Bradley said the situation could prompt a backlash from India’s agents.

She said if things did not improve the agents would start taking their business elsewhere.

“Because of the way in which agents are feeling offended and upset by this in India, we’re simply not getting the applications going in. Because they’ll go to other places where the requirements are either more clearly understood or where the restrictions are not so stringent, like Australia, like Canada.”

Ms Bradley said tertiary institutions, the government and Indian education agents had all invested heavily in attracting Indian students to New Zealand.

But she said that investment was in danger.

Auckland International Education Group spokesperson Paul Chalmers said informal communication with agents in India indicated there could be problems.

“They’re very unhappy that a number of them have been characterized as a fraudsters and that the reaction by Immigration New Zealand will significantly affect the business of good agents.”

Mr Chalmers said tertiary institutions were now being told the rates of visa refusal for each of their agents and they should be given six months to work through that with their agents.

‘Shoddy agents’ – still in business?

But a spokesman for licensed immigration advisors from India, Munish Sekhri, said there were a large number of dodgy agents in India, many of whom entered the market after English-language rules were relaxed in 2013.

The rules were tightened again for India at the end of 2015, but Mr Sekhri said the bad agents were still in business and more controls were needed.

“When easy funding was available and no English was required a lot of shoddy agents had come out in the market. It was just like mushrooming after a rainfall. So just to bring some accountability, we propose that at least a limited licence should be introduced for student visa advisors.”

Education New Zealand chief executive Grant McPherson said there were fewer visa applications at the start of this year than at the same time last year, but that was due to changes to English language requirements for India.

He said Education New Zealand had not detected any downturn in enrollments due to the fraud issues but it was watching the situation carefully.

“We’re working closely with agencies and the New Zealand High Commission to make sure we are understanding the impact in that impact. But we actually need to monitor it very closely and make sure our actions aren’t going to let one small group who are acting in an inappropriate way affect an entire industry.”

Source : radionz

  • July 18, 2016
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Pasifika

New Zealand’s oldest Pasifika Education

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Is New Zealand’s oldest Pasifika Education Centre doomed?

The battle to save New Zealand’s oldest Pacific community education provider could be drawing to a close.

The Pasifika Education Centre in Papatoetoe was founded in 1974 to help educate the country’s rising Pacific Island population. 

Last year it secured $763,000 funding through the Tertiary Education Commission which is guaranteed through until December 31 this year.

But there have been no assurances the funding will continue. 

Labour’s Pacific Island Affairs spokesperson William Sio says a lack of funding will mean the battle to save the centre could be lost and it might have to close in December.

“In a written question I asked the Pacific Peoples Minister Sam Lotu-Iiga whether he would put a bid in for more money. His answer was a blunt no,” Sio says. 

“Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga says the PEC will develop a strategy that focuses on Pasifika language and culture. Such a strategy will be meaningless without the $700,000 operational funding that’s needed to deliver it.

“It’s tragic that a centre that is close to the heart of Pacific people could be allowed to wither away.”

Sio says the minister seems to have become “so disconnected from the role PEC plays in promoting Pasifika languages and culture that he now refuses to fund it”.

But Lotu-Iiga says he supports “any initiatives” which promote Pacific language and culture.
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“PEC and the Tertiary Education Commission are working together to develop a long-term sustainable model to provide community-based Pasifika language and cultural education.

“I understand PEC is in discussions with the Manukau Institute of Technology about a future partnership.

“Learning Pacific languages is encouraged in the New Zealand curriculum from early childhood education through to secondary school.”

Pasifika Education Centre board chairman Sai Lealea says it’s “business as usual” at the centre.

“With support of government officials, we are still working to develop a long-term strategy focused on Pacific languages and cultural education. 

“The Government can continue to consider PEC’s future funding when the strategy has been finalised.”

The most widely spoken language in New Zealand is English, followed by te reo Maori and Samoan. 

Go to pacificislandeducation.co.nz for more information on PEC.

-stuff

  • July 14, 2016
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massey_image_1_2

NZ Tertiary College celebrates educational relationship

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NZ Tertiary College celebrates educational relationship

New Zealand Tertiary College celebrates educational relationship with China

New Zealand Tertiary College (NZTC) continues to lead the way in early childhood education learning in China, recently celebrating the inaugural graduation of 142 students who have completed a New Zealand Qualifications Authority approved Certificate in Early Childhood Teaching (Level 6) as part of the Sino-New Zealand Cooperation Program.

The program, which commenced in 2013, is a collaboration between NZTC, Fujian Preschool Education College and the education agency China Liberal Technology Development Company Limited to support early childhood teacher education in China.

A strong educational relationship has developed between NZTC and China, further strengthened by the addition of NZTC to the Chinese Ministry of Education’s Study Abroad List in December last year.

Supported by Education New Zealand (ENZ) throughout the establishment of the cooperation program, the college was honoured to have ENZ government representative in China, Alexandra Grace, attend the graduation ceremony and share a special message with the graduates.

“Relationships between countries are shaped by leaders, but developed by people. As the first cohort of graduates you are now dual ambassadors both for China and New Zealand. You hold in your hands, and in your hearts, and in your minds an understanding of both our countries which is necessary to take the New Zealand – China relationship to greater heights still,” said Grace.

NZTC Chief Executive Selena Fox was at the inaugural graduation in Fuzhou to award the graduates with their NZTC certificates and to further honour two outstanding graduates with an Academic Excellence award and an NZTC Values award.

“This inaugural event is a symbol of the successful cooperation that crosses oceans, languages and cultures between New Zealand and China as we come together because of our shared commitment to the education of teachers and the children of China.”

Further educational opportunities are available for the graduates as they consider completing an NZTC Bachelor of Education (ECE) in China or New Zealand, or a teaching qualification in New Zealand.

  • July 11, 2016
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Focus on increasing international student

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Focus on increasing international student numbers in Hawke’s Bay

International student numbers in Hawke’s Bay increased by four per cent in 2015, according to new government figures.

But the region is on track for even further growth in international enrolments numbers, as increasing numbers of international education agents arrive to personally check out the region.

Education Hawke’s Bay estimates that ground work being done now will bring another 300-plus students into the region over a year, taking the total to about 1600 international students spread over 12 schools and six tertiary institutions across Hastings and Napier.

International students are estimated to not only spend between $25,000 and $30,000 a year on school fees, homestay payments, and general purchases, it is also common for family to visit the at least once while they study, adding a tourism element to the equation.

But the benefits are not only economic, says Education Hawke’s Bay business development manager Stephanie Kennard, who is based at Hastings District Council.

“Having international students in our classrooms enriches the lives of our students. Studying alongside a child from, say, China, Taiwan, Germany or Brazil, enhances our social and cultural understanding; it enriches our children’s experience at school.”

Figures from the first quarter of this year indicate the goal should be achieved. Study visas noting Hawke’s Bay as the destination were up by 26 per cent in the quarter ended March 2016 compared to the same three months the year before.

Part of the process is “selling” the region, and education agents were in Hastings and Napier two weeks ago to see what was on offer for students from the countries they represented: China, Thailand, Spain and Brazil.

The group  had morning tea with Hastings mayor Lawrence Yule after a formal greeting, then toured several schools and institutions across Hawke’s Bay including Lindisfarne College, Iona College, Woodford House and Hereworth School. They also sampled some of the region’s tourism highlights including a trip up Te Mata Peak.

The agents were first met at International Student Agent Expo in Melbourne in April where they expressed an interest in Hawke’s Bay; particularly local tourist activities, hospitality and culture, as well as the schools and tertiary institutions.

Ms Kennard says bringing all the schools able to host international students together to market their services overseas is very cost effective.

“It means that at events such as educational expos or when we are hosting agents, we can offer the various benefits that our institutions offer. They are quite different, and actually they work very well together.”

The bigger picture

Education Hawke’s Bay is funded by tertiary institutions and schools across the region and comes under the aegis of Education NZ. Teaching establishments can become members of Education Hawke’s Bay if they are signatories to the Code of Practice for the Pastoral Care of International Students.

The push is part of a drive by Education NZ to increase the international student numbers nationally. It is assessed that the students spend about $3 billion a year in New Zealand. The aim is to take that up to $5b, and the regions are expected to be a big part of that.

Education NZ business development general manager Clive Jones told Radio New Zealand in May that the national organisation was keen to see the regions to take up the challenge. Auckland has 62per cent of the international student market, to be expected given its size and educational opportunities.

Ms Kennard said the regions have unique offerings that strongly appeal to parents of students; particularly those wishing to have their students study in a safe city, experience the local culture and practice their English as New Zealand schools and institutions do not tend to have large groups from one country or culture.

According to government figures released yesterday, the fastest growing markets for New Zealand education in 2015 were India with a 45 per cent increase in international student enrolments (9,013), China up 13 per cent (3,881), and the Philippines up 83 per cent

hawkesbay

  • July 8, 2016
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New Zealand's top schools to study IT revealed

Thousands of Indian students denied visas

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Thousands of Indian students denied visas

Tertiary institutions are trying to enrol thousands of Indian students that Immigration New Zealand does not believe are really intending to study here.

Figures provided under the Official Information Act show 51 institutions, including half of the country’s polytechnics, have visa decline rates for Indian students of more than 30 percent.

At most of the institutions more than half of applications are being turned down and at one the decline rate is 86 percent.

The figures cover the six months from the start of December 2015 to the end of May 2016 and are only for institutions with at least 10 visa applications from Indian students. They show that Immigration New Zealand turned down 3864 visa applications for the institutions, and approved 3176 during that time.

Immigration New Zealand told RNZ’s Insight programme that most of the declined applications in the first four months of this year were because it did not believe the applicant was really coming to study, or because it did not believe they had enough money to support themselves.

In 2014, Immigration New Zealand warned New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA) that high refusal rates could indicate problems with tertiary institutions.

“For the purpose of prioritization INZ believes that a provider who has an average decline rate of 30 percent or above warrants urgent attention. Such a high decline rate would give INZ serious cause for concern that the provider does not have adequate systems and processes in place to control the quality of the offers of place being issued, or that business practices are flawed.”

Immigration said it had increased its audits of providers with high decline rates and was now assessing information obtained from the 10 establishments it had visited so far.

It also had other tools, such as extra verification of visas applications for providers with high decline rates.

NZQA said it was assessing what it should do about the providers, but noted it recently gained new powers for dealing with rogue institutions.

Auckland International Education Group spokesperson Paul Chalmers said the vast majority of the declined applications were not cases of fraud, but were simply not up to Immigration’s specifications.

Immigration was sometimes turning down bona fide students, he said.

“Whenever we have had an appeal from an agent we have taken it to INZ and won it.”

The international education spokesperson for the private sector body, Independent Tertiary Education, Richard Goodall, said Immigration was being tougher on applications from India, but visa decline rates above 50 percent were questionable.

“You’re getting more declined than accepted, something’s wrong along the way.”

His institution relied on agents to provide information about students, but it checked that information and often interviewed the students to make sure they should be enrolled, he said.

“I think there are, and there probably always will be, some who are more inclined to take the marginal ones than we are. It’s always painful for private enterprise to turn away a customer.”

The chief executive of Newton College of Business and Technology in Auckland, Ashish Trivedi, told Insight that all institutions enrolling from India were having a lot of students turned down.

His organisation was one of 21 that Immigration New Zealand said had decline rates above 60 percent.

“Some of it is a real necessary crack down on fraudulent activities and we support that. We have had rejections to student visa applications based on fraudulent activities. Working in Indian market you are going to be affected by that,” Mr Trivedi said.

Imperial College of New Zealand, which had the highest rate of refused applications at 86 percent, did not respond to RNZ’s request for comment.

Minister of Tertiary Education Steven Joyce said institutions must sign up to a Code of Practice in order to enroll foreign students and recent changes to that document would help NZQA weed out any bad operators.

“What this does is make sure that NZQA, with supporting information from Immigration New Zealand, and as the code administrator will be able to say, ‘no we’re not happy with the practices here and if we don’t see a very significant change immediately you’re placing your whole future at risk’.”

Income from foreign students was growing steadily toward the government’s target of $5 billion a year by 2025, Mr Joyce said.

  • July 6, 2016
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New Zealand's top schools to study IT revealed

Indian students wanting a future in New Zealand face deportation

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Widespread fraud found among education agencies representing Indian students

An Immigration New Zealand investigation has revealed widespread use of fake documents by Indian education agents to get students in to New Zealand.

The agents offer immigration advice and prepare student visas for Indian students wanting to study in New Zealand.

Documents released under the Official Information Act show 44 agents had been involved in the fraud in the March 2016 year alone.

In total, 57 agents had been identified as using fraudulent methods – some using fake documents for almost all of their applicants. Immigration lawyer Alastair McClymont said the main fraud was creating false bank documents to show the student’s family had access to funds to pay school fees.

He was representing around 20 students facing deportation from New Zealand to India who were unaware the documents prepared on their behalf by the agents had been fake.

There had always been fraud in the student visa market, he said, but it was getting worse as student numbers increased – with some students claiming to be victims and others culprits.

According to Statistics New Zealand, 9800 people arrived from India on student visas in the year to March 2016.

Immigration New Zealand general manager Stephen Dunstan said offshore agents providing immigration advice to New Zealand had to be licensed, except for those providing student visas.

The department had intelligence gathering and support resources for immigration officers in India and had created new standard operating procedures.

“The new [procedures] has been highly effective with 145 such cases identified as at 11 June, along with 151 cases involving other types of fraud. These applications have been declined.”

Where there was concern the methods had been used, the students were identified and served deportation notices “where appropriate,” he said.

Two of the students McClymont was representing – who did not want want their full names used – said they were ashamed to be victims.

A student named Imran said he didn’t want to go back to India without completing his degree. He was afraid he had wasted his time and money coming to New Zealand and being deported would bring shame upon his family in India.

“We want to learn something here, achieve something here. If we go back, what was the use,” he said.

Imran only found out about the false documentation when he was approached by Immigration New Zealand, and said he was “shattered”.

“I’m not sure what will happen in my future. Will I be able to complete my studies or not?”

Another student, Kieran, said he was not sure how he ended up facing deportation as he had done nothing wrong. He was disappointed in New Zealand and ashamed to have come here, especially after contributing to the economy.

“We are spending our money here. We are helping New Zealand in the revenue part,” he said.

“I feel bad being part of New Zealand.”

McClymont wants the Government to make amendments to the Immigration Advisors Licensing Act which would see overseas education agents licensed and regulated.

However, Christine Clark, chairwoman of the Independent Tertiary Education New Zealand board, said regulating would have huge ramifications.

“If we start putting compliance on the agents, then all the agent’s going to do is say New Zealand’s too hard and we’re going to send students to Australia and Canada.”

Most independent organisations checked the credibility of agents and generally did not work with the bad ones – however, there was no real way to tell, she said.

“We’re told that it’s our responsibility to be working with good agents but some of those agents marked as fraudulent are actually licensed agents.”

Immigration New Zealand should be informing education providers as to who the fraudulent agents were so the providers could cease using them, she said.

Dunstan said in the current review of the Immigration Advisers Licensing Act, the exemption of offshore student agents was “being looked at”.

Education New Zealand was also reviewing the Recognized Agency Programme it had for agencies with a record of success in New Zealand, he said.

– Stuff

  • July 5, 2016
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learnNZ

Students look to the future with MYOB

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Students look to the future with MYOB

Virtual reality recruitment testing, embeddable personnel management devices, annotated employee registries, and an intuitive business task manager are just some of the innovative solutions New Zealand’s best IT and business students are creating to optimise every-day business tasks.

At the MYOB National IT Challenge in Auckland this weekend student teams from universities around the country presented their solutions and business plans to a panel of expert judges from leading accounting software provider MYOB and online transportation network company Uber.

MYOB General Manager Engineering and Experience Adam Ferguson says the judges were very impressed with the calibre of solutions that were presented.

“The dynamic nature of technology means it is important to always look to the future and utilise cutting-edge tools when creating solutions. The students that presented in the MYOB IT Challenge have applied their knowledge and skills to build a range of creative and useful tools to help businesses succeed.”

The two-day national competition, run in conjunction with the University of Auckland’s Management Consulting Club, was split into two rounds. Round one on Friday saw teams from the University of Auckland, University of Waikato, University of Canterbury and Victoria University of Wellington pitch their client problem, summary of the solution and the business implementation to the judges at the MYOB offices in Auckland. In round two held at the University of Auckland Business School the following day, the four top teams took the feedback from round one and presented the prototype that they built.

The winning team, from Victoria University, created a cloud-based two-way human resources engagement solution designed to simplify and optimise the employee experience working with their employers. The solution, which integrates biometric security and annotated customer support, allows employee information to be centralised and carried over between employers as needed.

“This team showed they really understood the issues that employees often face, and used emerging technologies to build a truly creative solution,” says Mr Ferguson.

The spokesperson for the winning team Liam Dennis, says that the MYOB IT Challenge really helped them apply what they are learning in their classes to a real-life situation.

“By taking part it boosted our ability to work as a team while challenging us to understand all facets of a business.

“One key thing we learnt through the competition was that focusing on people, rather than just the technology, helps us create a more holistic solution,” he says.

Having grown from an Auckland event last year to nationwide in 2016, Mr Ferguson says that MYOB looks forward to continuing to host the challenge in subsequent years.

“As an industry it essential that we continue to encourage the fresh thinking of tomorrow. The challenge not only gives students a taste of what lies ahead of them after graduating, but fosters the kind of entrepreneurial thinking that will have a role in shaping how we do business in the future,” he says.

Source : voxy

  • June 30, 2016
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India-visa rejection rate tops 50pc – immigration NZ

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India-visa rejection rate tops 50pc

More Indian student visas have been declined than approved in the past 10 months, as Immigration New Zealand battles widespread fraud.

In figures revealed to the Herald, 10,863 of the 20,887 applications the agency received from applicants in India were declined. Among the declined applications, 9190 had been lodged by unlicensed education advisers, student agents and lawyers who are exempt from licensing.

Munish Sekhri, vice-president of Licensed Immigration Advisers NZ, an India-based group representing licensed agents, said fraud in India was widespread and it would be an “uphill challenge” for Immigration to “win the war”.

“I would say one in three applicants from Punjab would have used some form of deception and up to 80 per cent for those from Hyderabad,” said Mr Sekhri. “The unlicensed agents they use do anything from arranging fake documents, providing fraudulent funding and even an imposter service.”

For about $1000, agents would set up fake emails and phone numbers to impersonate clients to take verification calls from Immigration.

An advertisement in an Indian newspaper from a company called Imperial Education reads: “Study in New Zealand … even if you don’t have funds to show, we can help you get visa.”

“It is true that many, many PTEs [private training establishments] and some ITPs [institutes of technology and polytechnics] have actively promoted this fraud,” said Mr Sekhri. “These providers prefer working with unlicensed agents in India, who drive large numbers of students to NZ, who have no accountability to anyone.”

He said mandatory licensing of student-finding agents was urgently needed to rid the industry of “cowboys”.

Over the past two years, Immigration’s Mumbai office – which processes all student visas from Indian nationals – uncovered 265 education agents who submitted applications with fraudulent information. It also found 338 applicants had used imposters, 340 with fraudulent funds and 39 with forged documents. Since 2010, 1248 Indian nationals were either deported or left voluntarily, 74 of them in the year to April.

Immigration NZ area manager Michael Carley said the agency and the Immigration Advisers Authority (IAA) were aware of these fraudulent methods.

“To help address this, the IAA and INZ ran a campaign in India earlier this year encouraging people to use a New Zealand licensed adviser if they were seeking assistance to come.”

The campaign would continue in New Zealand over the next three months. The exemption of offshore student advisers from licensing was also being reviewed.

India is New Zealand’s second-largest and fastest-growing source country for international students. However, student visa approvals for Indians – at 49 per cent – is the lowest among the main international student markets.

Source : 24h.bestthenews.com

  • June 21, 2016
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The robots are coming, should we be worried?

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The robots are coming, should we be worried?

It’s a much-discussed topic among 21st century humans: will I lose my job to a robot?

Despite countless stories in the media about the threat of “robot redundancy”, a new survey has found most Kiwis don’t see machines as a workplace worry.

The Massey University study found 87.5 per cent of respondents either disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement “smart technology, artificial intelligence, robotics or algorithms could take my job”.

“Despite experts like Bill Gates and Stephen Hawking warning about mass unemployment in the future, it seems very few New Zealanders are making any plans to change out of jobs that might disappear over the next five to 10 years,” said study leader Dr David Brougham, of Massey’s School of Management.

“It was interesting that those who most strongly denied the possibility of a machine doing their job were often from the sectors most at risk, like checkout operators, drivers and analysts.

These are all areas where we can already see technology having an impact.”

A storeroom assistant told him he believed machines wouldn’t “affect my career at all” while a business support employee said: “We work in the service industry, robots are irrelevant.”

“It was bizarre reading some of the interview quotes, but I guess ignorance can be bliss,” he said.

“People think their jobs are harder than they actually are. Often jobs actually consist of a set of repetitive actions that can be codified and done by a robot.

“This applies to many jobs currently considered high skill, like accountants, lawyers and researchers. There is report-writing software now available that is practically flawless.”

The study showed younger employees were generally more concerned about smart technology and automation than older employees.

Young people who were aware of the potential impact of technology also reported a significant drop in organizational commitment and career satisfaction.

The younger generation was “definitely” more concerned, he said.

“They are both more aware of the coming changes and more likely to care about the impact of those changes because they have a longer working life ahead of them.

“Realistically, if you are someone in your 60s you probably won’t care if you are made redundant in five years because you are nearing retirement anyway.”

However, those who weren’t worried about job-killing robots might not be far off the mark after all.

Following a raft of concerning, headline-grabbing studies — including Oxford University research that found 47 per cent of all employment in the United States was at risk of being replaced by computers and algorithms in the next 20 years, and a recent Australian report putting the proportion of vulnerable jobs at 44 per cent — a new investigation has found this risk has been largely overblown.

The forensic study by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) found that, of the 21 advanced nations it looked at, only 9 per cent of jobs were “potentially automatize” — a dramatic difference.

“They looked at the tasks involved in each job and found that a lot of them couldn’t be done by robots and software,” said Dr Bruce MacDonald, a robotics expert at the University of Auckland.

While there was much modernisation of production across the manufacturing sector, along with industries like forestry and dairy farming, Dr MacDonald noted New Zealand was still bringing in farm workers from the Philippines as it couldn’t find enough labour.

The Oxford study, from 2013, has been widely cited — most recently by two Northland clinicians who wrote in the New Zealand Medical Journal that AI would soon perform a significant amount of the diagnostic and treatment decision-making traditionally performed by doctors.

– NZ Herald

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