downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 8096.23articles per million people
- Year
- 2023. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IP.JRN.ARTC.SC)
- History
New Zealand
Strongest usable evidence: Agency, at 92.3. Raise Building first, at 34.6. Coordination needs more evidence: confidence is 0.23.
Raise, lowest first
| Dimension | Confidence | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Building | 0.55 | 34.6 |
Measure before managing
| Dimension | Confidence | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Coordination | 0.23 | 75.1 |
| Shared Purpose | 0.28 | 82.0 |
| Experimentation | 0.33 | 43.8 |
These lists are the country's capability agenda, computed from the scores. Read the full agenda. It names comparable evidence from other countries and the 18 gaps in the registry.
Why this country is included: Added in the 9.0.0 completion, which takes every country of a million people or more that is measurable in all nine capabilities.
Anticipation77.1Confidence0.46usableHow capable is the country of identifying and preparing for emerging change?
New Zealand
Read New Zealand beside up to three other countries, down to the indicator behind every row.
- Usable or good evidence
- Thin evidence, hollow point. The dashes open further as confidence falls.
- The point still sits at the score, because confidence never moves it.
- Click any axis to see every country on that dimension.
A score from 0 to 100 is a position inside the frame that all the benchmark countries set: zero is the weakest on a dimension and 100 is the strongest. A score of 10 puts a country near the floor of that frame and does not mean 10 percent of a capability.
| Agency | 0.56 | 4 of 5 | 0.75 | no trend | no data | no estimate | |
| Trust | 0.49 | 5 of 7 | 0.83 | no trend | no data | no estimate | |
| Learning | 0.54 | 3 of 4 | 0.78 | no trend | no data | no estimate | |
| Shared Purpose | 0.28 | 2 of 6 | 0.92 | no trend | 71.0 | -11.0 | |
| Anticipation | 0.46 | 2 of 4 | 0.96 | +7.7(2) | 75.0 | -2.1 | |
| Coordination | 0.23 | 2 of 5 | 0.79 | no trend | 70.0 | -5.1 | |
| Adaptability | 0.62 | 4 of 6 | 1.00 | no trend | no data | no estimate | |
| Experimentation | 0.33 | 4 of 9 | 0.81 | -18.2(3) | no data | no estimate | |
| Building | 0.55 | 4 of 6 | 0.88 | -1.3(3) | no data | no estimate |
How to read this page
Each dimension has a score from 0 to 100. It shows where this country sits among all 125 countries in the comparison frame, not a percentage. Confidence sits beside the score. A dashed radar edge and hollow point mean the evidence is thin. The records below show each indicator, its raw value, year and source.
A panel estimate, when present, is a separate judgment about what the indicators miss. It does not change the score or confidence. The panel's provenance is shown beside the estimate.
- direct capability measuredirect capability measure Measures the thing itself.
- capability inputcapability input Measures something that supports the capability.
- downstream outcomedownstream outcome Measures a result that usually follows from the capability.
- perception proxyperception proxy Records what people or experts say, not what they did.
Confidence
- very thin0.00 to 0.25
The score rests on one or two indicators. Do not quote it on its own.
- thin0.25 to 0.45
A minority of indicators, or evidence old enough to have moved. Read with care.
- usable0.45 to 0.65
Enough evidence to compare countries, with known holes.
- good0.65 and above
Most indicators observed, recent, from official or intergovernmental sources.
A row marked no dataset exists is a gap: the benchmark wants data that nobody publishes. A retired row has a source this project chose not to use. Both reduce confidence. The glossary defines each term, and the limits page lists where these numbers are known to be wrong about the world.
Anticipation
How capable is the country of identifying and preparing for emerging change?
+7.7 over 10 years, from 69.4 in 2016 to 77.1 on 2 indicators seen in both years.
Trends use fewer indicators than the current score and use today's frame. A longer span reaches further back.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 91.739index 0-100
- Year
- 2024. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IQ.SPI.OVRL)
- History
Government foresight capacity
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no dataindex 0-100
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- none
- History
- no data
Note: No comparable international dataset. OECD and UN work is descriptive, not scored. Envisioning would have to build this.
Long-horizon research commitments
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no data% of new grants
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- none
- History
- no data
Note: Redefined 2026-10-02 (D152). The row asked for the share of R&D spending classed as basic research, which is the make-up of a spending stock, the construct D142 retired business R&D share for. OECD MSTI publishes that share for its members only, and UNESCO UIS no longer serves R&D by type of research (construct audit, 2026-10-02). The behaviour behind it is a funder committing to a horizon: a grant awarded for five years or more is a decision to wait for a result. Untried: no memo has triaged a grant register. National funders publish award lists one by one with their own durations, and commercial grant aggregators fail the inspectability rule. Wireable on a grant-level register with award and end dates, on one definition of a competitive public grant, for half the frame or more.
Conditions, not scored
What the country has to work with on this capability. The values are shown as the source published them and are not part of the score, the confidence or the trend. The rank counts the countries with a value, best first.
R&D expenditureWorld Bank (GB.XPD.RSDV.GD.ZS), 2023
1.5 % of GDP, rank 26 of 118. Gross domestic expenditure on research and development as a share of GDP.
A condition, not scored: money committed to research is what a country spends, and spending it does not show the country reads the future well (D122).
Researchers in R&DWorld Bank (SP.POP.SCIE.RD.P6), 2023
5,435 per million people, rank 17 of 114. Full-time-equivalent researchers per million people.
A condition, not scored: a standing stock of people who could investigate is what a country has, not a record of what they found (D122). Correlates with income but survives size normalization.
Secure internet serversWorld Bank (IT.NET.SECR.P6), 2024
18,709 per million people, rank 34 of 125. Servers using encryption in internet transactions, per million people.
A condition, not scored: a diffusion stock of digital adoption that money buys, not an act of anticipation (D122). Spans four orders of magnitude, so its rank is read on the published value and its correlations on the logged one.
Evidence for missing indicators
Each record describes a case the indicators above cannot see. It does not affect the score or confidence because one case is not comparable across countries. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.
Long-term Insights Briefings under the Public Service Act 2020
New Zealand's Public Service Act 2020 required every departmental chief executive to publish a Long-term Insights Briefing on future trends, risks and opportunities at least once every three years, and nineteen were published in the first round, which concluded in mid-2023, four of them produced jointly by several agencies.
19 briefings, long-term insights briefings published in the first round, 2023 (mid-year). Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, The Policy Project, Long-term Insights Briefings page (last updated 11 December 2025), retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: A public service statute obliges every department head to consult the public on a topic, write a briefing on medium and long-term trends with policy options, and table it at least once every three years, with the centre of government publishing guidance and reviewing the round.
Limits: The live dpmc.govt.nz page returns 403 to scripts, so it was read from a Wayback Machine copy of 18 June 2026; the page is the coordinating department reporting on a duty it guides. It is a statutory duty spread across departments, not a single foresight unit with its own budget and staff, and the count measures briefings published, not their quality or influence: DPMC's own review of the first round assessed the process only and said so. Started is 2020, the year of the Act that created the duty; the page does not give the year the first briefings were published. The briefings are think pieces independent of ministers and are not government policy. Whether the second round has kept the same number of briefings is not stated on the page.
Panel estimate, round 2, how this layer works
- 75.0 institutionalist@claude-opus-5-5, self-confidence 0.50
I move down one point on panelist B's point that Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 caught regional preparedness short. Statutory long-term fiscal statements, long-term insights briefings, the Climate Change Commission's carbon budgets and the Earthquake Commission remain durable foresight institutions, which is why I do not follow panelist C lower.
- 75.0 bottom_up@claude-opus-5-5, self-confidence 0.50
A's points on the 2018 census failure and the 2024 abolition of advisory bodies are ones I had not weighed, so I trim a point; I stay above C because long-term insights briefings, statutory fiscal statements and carbon budgets are institutionalised foresight beyond the indicator rows.
- 71.0 wealth_sceptic@claude-sonnet-5-5, self-confidence 0.40
Statutory carbon budgets, long-term insights briefings and the pandemic border response are behavioural foresight rather than purchase. Gabrielle, infrastructure deficits and the 2018 census failure show it is uneven, so I move up three points but remain below the panelists who hold at 76.
Agency
How able are individuals and organizations to turn an intention into action?
No trend is shown because too few indicators have values at both ends. The rows below still show the available history.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 16.048per 1,000 aged 15-64
- Year
- 2024. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.BUS.NDNS.ZS)
- History
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 0.5days
- Year
- 2019. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.REG.DURS.MA.DY)
- History
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 1count
- Year
- 2019. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.REG.PROC.MA.NO)
- History
Adults doing digital tasks
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no data% of adults
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- ITU / UNESCO UIS (SDG 4.4.1, ICT skills by type)
- History
- no data
Note: Redefined 2026-10-02 (D152). The row asked whether adults can perform standard digital tasks, which reads a skill level, the kind of stock D122 moved out of the scores with internet users. It now counts the act: a person who did the task. It is not the internet users condition beside it, which counts access. Candidate: ITU ICT skills by type (SDG 4.4.1) through the UNESCO UIS API, probed 2026-10-02. Sent a message with an attached file reaches 33 of the 53 countries then in the frame, 25 at 2018 or later, with no United States, India or China and most of Africa and Central America missing; two other task items reach 31 and 16. The items are self-reported and the task list has changed between rounds. Wireable on one task observed for half the frame or more at 2018 or later.
perception proxyobserved
- Raw value
- 7.7mean 1-10
- Year
- 2022. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- Joint EVS/WVS (A173)
- History
- one year
Conditions, not scored
What the country has to work with on this capability. The values are shown as the source published them and are not part of the score, the confidence or the trend. The rank counts the countries with a value, best first.
Individuals using the internetWorld Bank (IT.NET.USER.ZS), 2024
93.5 % of population, rank 23 of 125. Share of the population that used the internet in the last three months.
A condition, not scored: access to the basic tool of modern agency is what people have to act with, not a record of them acting (D122). Saturates near 95%, which compresses the top of the range.
Financial account ownershipWorld Bank (FX.OWN.TOTL.ZS), 2024
97.9 % aged 15+, rank 22 of 122. Adults with an account at a bank or mobile money provider.
A condition, not scored: holding an account is the precondition for almost any economic action, not the action (D122). Global Findex, published every three years.
Credit to the private sectorWorld Bank (FS.AST.PRVT.GD.ZS), 2025
143 % of GDP, rank 7 of 124. Domestic credit provided to the private sector by financial corporations.
A condition, not scored: financial depth is a stock of money available to actors, not what they do with it (D122). High values can also signal a credit bubble, so more is not always better.
Coordination
How effectively can independent actors organize around shared objectives?
No trend is shown because too few indicators have values at both ends. The rows below still show the available history.
Government effectiveness
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataz-score -2.5 to 2.5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (GOV_WGI_GE.EST)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. The WGI aggregate the opinions of experts and firms, and in this set the four WGI series correlate with each other between 0.93 and 0.98 while correlating with log GDP per capita at 0.91. That is one perception of national wealth counted in three dimensions. Cross-agency delivery records are the replacement and they are a declared gap. See D23 and A4.
Regulatory quality
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataz-score -2.5 to 2.5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (GOV_WGI_RQ.EST)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. Same measurement as government effectiveness, filed under a different name, correlating with it above 0.93. See D23 and A4.
Logistics performance
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataindex 1-5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (LP.LPI.OVRL.XQ)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. The LPI is a survey of international freight forwarders, so it records how a country looks to global logistics firms. A small country with a small port scores low whatever its state can organise, which is artefact A9. Container throughput and border time are observable and stay. See D23.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 37hours
- Year
- 2019. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (TRD.ACRS.BRDR.EXPT.BRDR.COMP.HR.DB1619)
- History
Budget execution fidelity
direct capability measuremissing- Raw value
- no datapercentage points from approved budget
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (GF.XPD.BUDG.ZS)
- History
- no data
Note: Observable alignment between an approved public plan and what government spent. The API covers 113 of 125 countries, with a latest year between 2016 and 2024. Values above and below 100 both indicate deviation, so the transform measures absolute distance from the approved budget rather than rewarding overspending. See D55.
University-industry collaboration
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no dataindex 0-100
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- Global Innovation Index
- History
- no data
Note: GII carries it, but the underlying item is a WEF executive opinion survey whose microdata is not inspectable. Excluded on principle 4.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 0.656index 0-1
- Year
- 2025. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- V-Dem (v2x_cspart)
- History
- one year
Public-private collaboration
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no dataindex 0-100
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- none
- History
- no data
Note: No comparable dataset. PPP investment databases measure infrastructure finance, not collaboration capacity.
Behavioral check, not scored
Each number below is published beside the score and stays out of it. It is not in the frame, the average, the indicator count or the confidence.
Customs clearance time for exportsWorld Bank (IC.CUS.DURS.EX), 2023
24.793 days, lower is better. Average number of days to clear direct exports through customs, as reported by manufacturing firms that export directly, in the World Bank Enterprise Surveys.
Days a manufacturer that exports directly says its goods took to clear customs, from the World Bank Enterprise Surveys. It is the time the border took on firms' own shipments, current where the Doing Business border time this capability scores is frozen at 2019. It is not scored for two reasons. The number of firms behind each country's figure is published only in the survey microdata, and on a proxy from the published tables 37 of the 53 countries in the frame when it was checked clear 30 exporting firms; Mexico, the Philippines, Israel and nine others may not. And the question changed: surveys fielded from 2024 also ask how long release took across all border agencies, and drop an answer where customs alone took longer, so a country surveyed on both sides of the change can move severalfold with nothing at its border changing. India reads 17.3 days in 2022 and 2.5 in 2025, on more than 9,000 firms each time. No country in the frame has two surveys on the new questionnaire yet. Income is not why it is left out: it barely tracks log GDP per capita.
Evidence for missing indicators
Each record describes a case the indicators above cannot see. It does not affect the score or confidence because one case is not comparable across countries. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.
Ultra-Fast Broadband programme
The Crown's infrastructure investment company, now National Infrastructure Funding and Financing, co-funded a fibre network built and owned by Chorus, Northpower, Enable and Tuatahi First Fibre, which was completed in December 2022 covering 87 percent of the population in 412 towns and cities, with NZ$1.75 billion of government funding in a programme costing more than NZ$5.5 billion.
87 % of population, population covered by the ufb fibre network at completion, 2022-12. 1.75 billion NZ$, government funding invested in ufb since 2010, of a total cost exceeding nz$5.5 billion, 2025. National Infrastructure Funding and Financing (formerly Crown Infrastructure Partners), Fibre programme page, retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: A Crown-owned company invested in regional fibre companies on the condition that they build an open-access, wholesale-only network to a fixed rollout plan, and recovered its investment as the companies sold connections, recycling the repayments into further extensions.
Limits: The Crown company that ran the programme reports on itself, and the page is promotional ('world leading', 'on time and under budget'); no audit figure for cost against the original budget was checked. The 87 percent is coverage (premises passed), not use: the same page gives uptake as 73 percent of UFB premises passed at 30 June 2025. The total cost above NZ$5.5 billion includes partner co-funding, so the private share is inferred, not stated, and NZ$390 million of the Crown's investment was repaid and recycled into extensions, which the page treats as reinvested rather than spent twice. The page does not describe how partners were chosen or on what terms; the corporate history (Crown Fibre Holdings, then Crown Infrastructure Partners, then National Infrastructure Funding and Financing) and the role of the incumbent's structural separation are background not shown on this page. The page has no date stamp; the uptake figure dates it to after June 2025.
Panel estimate, round 2, how this layer works
- 70.0 institutionalist@claude-opus-5-5, self-confidence 0.45
I hold 70. Panelist B's co-governance arrangements and post-disaster community responses are real, but the reversal of Three Waters and of co-governance shows coordination arrangements that do not outlast a change of government, which is the test I apply.
- 72.0 bottom_up@claude-opus-5-5, self-confidence 0.45
A and C are right that the Three Waters reversal and Auckland infrastructure failures show weak central-local alignment, so I trim two points; I stay above them because iwi-led and community responses after Christchurch and Gabrielle show distributed coordination the brief misses.
- 70.0 wealth_sceptic@claude-sonnet-5-5, self-confidence 0.40
Fast border processing, a strong civil society score and the Covid response and Canterbury rebuild show actors organising around shared goals, though some is small-country scale. Three Waters and Auckland infrastructure failures point the other way, so I hold.
Trust
How much cooperation is possible beyond immediate personal networks?
No trend is shown because too few indicators have values at both ends. The rows below still show the available history.
Rule of law
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataz-score -2.5 to 2.5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (GOV_WGI_RL.EST)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. A WGI perception composite correlating with control of corruption above 0.95 and with log GDP per capita at 0.83. Court throughput and case clearance rates are the observable replacement and are a declared gap. See D23 and A4.
Control of corruption
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataz-score -2.5 to 2.5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (GOV_WGI_CC.EST)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. A WGI perception composite. It measures reputation for corruption, which is not the same thing as corruption, and it tracks income closely. Prosecution and audit records are the observable replacement and are a declared gap. See D23 and A4.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 216days
- Year
- 2019. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (ENF.CONT.DURS.DY)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 3.976% of firms
- Year
- 2023. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.FRM.BRIB.ZS)
- History
- one year
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 3.682scale 0-4 (never to always)
- Year
- 2025. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- V-Dem (v2jucomp_osp)
- History
- one year
Intentional homicide rate
downstream outcomeretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataper 100,000 people
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (VC.IHR.PSRC.P5)
- History
- no data
Note: Added 2026-08-26 by D23 as the observable replacement for two retired WGI perception composites, and retired 2026-08-27 by D44 when the diagnostic built in D42 measured what it was doing. It raised this dimension's correlation with log GDP per capita by 0.288, from 0.096 to 0.385, the largest single wealth contribution anywhere in the model. It was added to fix wealth contamination and it was the wealth contamination. The dataset is sound and the objection is to what it measures here: homicide is driven heavily by organised crime, a society can be physically safe while trusting very little, and across this country set the variation it carries is mostly income. Behavioural trust measures remain a gap.
perception proxyobserved
- Raw value
- 56.6% agreeing
- Year
- 2022. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- Joint EVS/WVS (A165)
- History
- one year
Trust in public institutions
perception proxyno dataset exists- Raw value
- no data% expressing confidence
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- OECD Trust Survey / WVS
- History
- no data
Note: The OECD survey covers members only. Mixing it with WVS items for India and South Africa would break comparability. The Joint EVS/WVS confidence battery (E069) reaches 37 countries from one release, and confidence in the courts (E069_17) is published beside Trust as a check under this id rather than scored: every item of the battery tested (courts, civil service, police, parliament and government) reads higher in the closed and electoral autocracies of the frame than in its democracies, which is deference as much as confidence (A13). The gap stays open for a measure that does not reward a court that cannot rule against the state. See D132.
perception proxyobserved
- Raw value
- 50.1% expressing trust
- Year
- 2022. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- Joint EVS/WVS (G007_34_B)
- History
- one year
Court case clearance rate
downstream outcomeno dataset exists- Raw value
- no data% of incoming cases
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- CEPEJ / OECD / national court statistics
- History
- no data
Note: Whether a court finishes what it starts, counted from case records rather than asked in a survey. D23 named it as the observable replacement for the two retired WGI composites and it has stayed unfilled since. CEPEJ publishes it for Council of Europe members and OECD for its own members, so no single publisher reaches this country set, and a harmonised series needs the project second source adapter. See D57.
Behavioral check, not scored
Each number below is published beside the score and stays out of it. It is not in the frame, the average, the indicator count or the confidence.
Confidence in the courtsJoint EVS/WVS (E069_17), 2022
20.2 % a great deal, higher is better. Share of survey respondents saying they have a great deal of confidence in the justice system and courts, of the four answers a great deal, quite a lot, not very much and none at all, in the Joint EVS/WVS 2017 to 2022 survey round.
Confidence in the courts is the public half of what this capability asks: whether people expect the rules to be enforced when a stranger breaks them. It is not scored because the survey answer reads two things the number cannot tell apart. Where courts are independent, confidence is a judgment of how they perform. Where they answer to the state, it is also deference, and saying otherwise to an interviewer has a cost. In this frame the pattern runs the wrong way. India, the Philippines and Indonesia, all electoral autocracies in the V-Dem 2025 classification, lead on the share saying a great deal, and Vietnam and China, the two closed autocracies surveyed, lead once quite a lot is counted too. The ten electoral autocracies average 21.8 percent saying a great deal and the two closed autocracies 28.1, against 13.6 for liberal and 8.4 for electoral democracies. Scored, it would rank highest the states whose courts are least able to rule against them. Income is not why it is left out: the share correlates about -0.18 with log GDP per capita. The value is the share saying a great deal; the share saying quite a lot is in the source note.
Learning
How effectively does the country acquire, distribute, and update knowledge?
No trend is shown because too few indicators have values at both ends. The rows below still show the available history.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 0.776index 0-1
- Year
- 2020. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (HD.HCI.OVRL)
- History
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 66.045% of firms
- Year
- 2023. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.FRM.TRNG.ZS)
- History
- one year
Adult learning participation
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no data% of adults
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- Eurostat / OECD PIAAC
- History
- no data
Note: The best available measure of continuous learning capacity, and it exists only for European and OECD members.
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 1.751ratio to world average
- Year
- 2021. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- OpenAlex (citation_normalized_percentile.is_in_top_10_percent)
- History
- one year
Conditions, not scored
What the country has to work with on this capability. The values are shown as the source published them and are not part of the score, the confidence or the trend. The rank counts the countries with a value, best first.
Tertiary enrolmentWorld Bank (SE.TER.ENRR), 2024
77.2 % gross, rank 30 of 124. Gross enrolment ratio in tertiary education.
A condition, not scored: enrolment counts people in formal education and records nothing learned (D122).
Public education expenditureWorld Bank (SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZS), 2023
5.2 % of GDP, rank 33 of 125. Government expenditure on education as a share of GDP.
A condition, not scored: public spending on education is a pure input, and learning is what the dimension asks about (D122).
Vocational share of secondaryWorld Bank (SE.SEC.ENRL.VO.ZS), 2018
14.2 % of secondary, rank 53 of 125. Vocational pupils as a share of total secondary enrolment.
A condition, not scored: the share of secondary pupils on a vocational track describes how a school system is built, not what anyone learns in it, and higher is not unambiguously better (D141). It marks a route into skilled work that does not run through university. Learning reads research citation impact, firm training and the human capital index instead.
Evidence for missing indicators
Each record describes a case the indicators above cannot see. It does not affect the score or confidence because one case is not comparable across countries. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.
Adult and community education at tertiary providers, and its halving
New Zealand's adult and community education (ACE) delivered by universities, polytechnics, wฤnanga and private training establishments enrolled 23,610 domestic students in 2021, down from 49,365 in 2012, according to the Ministry of Education's Education Counts tables.
23,610 students, domestic students in adult and community education, all tertiary sub-sectors (table ace.3), 2021. 49,365 students, same count, first year of the published series, 2012. Ministry of Education (Te Tฤhuhu o te Mฤtauranga), Education Counts, tertiary participation, Adult-and-Community-Education.xlsx, Table ACE.3, as archived by the Internet Archive on 25 March 2023, retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: The Tertiary Education Commission funds short, often non-credit community courses for adults through tertiary providers, and the education ministry counts enrolments each year from provider returns.
Limits: The cited file is an Internet Archive copy: educationcounts.govt.nz answered 403 behind a bot check on 2026-10-02, and the archived September 2026 page that links a newer edition of the same spreadsheet returned 410 for the file, so the series stops at 2021 here although the ministry has published later years. The table counts only ACE delivered by tertiary providers; it leaves out ACE run by schools and community organisations, and 2012 is the first year of the table, not a demonstrated peak. Any funding change before 2012, including the reduction of ACE funding in schools commonly dated to 2009, is outside the series and was not read at a source for this record. Most of the fall is two steps: universities from 13,180 to 3,040 between 2012 and 2013, and polytechnics (now Te Pลซkenga) from 35,235 in 2016 to 27,975 in 2017 and 20,890 in 2020; the 2020 and 2021 counts are also depressed by COVID-19 lockdowns. Equivalent full-time student units held near 3,200 to 4,100 throughout, so fewer people took longer courses, and the fall in headcount is not a fall in hours of learning. Counts are students enrolled at any time in the year, rounded to the nearest 5, and students in two sub-sectors count in each. The started year is the first year of the published table, not the start of ACE funding, which is decades older.
Experimentation
How easily can new approaches be attempted, tested, abandoned, and improved?
-18.2 over 10 years, from 63.6 in 2016 to 45.4 on 3 indicators seen in both years.
-27.8 over 20 years, from 73.2 in 2006 to 45.4 on 3 indicators seen in both years.
Trends use fewer indicators than the current score and use today's frame. A longer span reaches further back.
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 330per million people
- Year
- 2021. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IP.PAT.RESD)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 24096per million people
- Year
- 2021. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IP.TMK.RSCT)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 320per million people
- Year
- 2021. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IP.IDS.RSCT)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 118273per million people
- Year
- 2026. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- GitHub Innovation Graph (data/repositories.csv)
- History
- no data
Venture deals
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no dataper million people
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- OECD / national VC associations
- History
- no data
Note: Redefined 2026-10-02 (D152). The id keeps its first name so evidence records, links and published files still resolve. The row asked for venture capital deployed as a share of GDP, a level of financial depth of the kind private credit is (D122). A count of first rounds counts attempts started with outside risk money, which is what this capability asks about, and a large round counts once. Candidates, none wireable: the OECD SME and Entrepreneurship Financing scoreboard carried venture capital for 6 of the 16 countries the frame held on 2026-08-26, as amounts in national currency, latest year 2022, with Brazil, India, South Africa and Singapore absent (D21); national venture capital associations publish counts on their own definitions; commercial deal databases cover the world and are not inspectable (D10). Wireable on an inspectable deal count with one definition of a first round for half the frame or more. Read A1 before treating this dimension as measured.
Early-stage entrepreneurial activity
direct capability measuremissing- Raw value
- no data% aged 18-64
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (APS key indicators, TEA rate)
- History
- no data
Note: From the GEM Adult Population Survey, entered by hand because GEM has no open API. TEA counts every new business, so necessity self-employment scores the same as a funded startup, which is why Chile and Argentina sit above the United States here. Read it as how many people are trying, not as how much value the attempts create. GEM does not run every economy every year: Singapore last took part in 2014 and the recency term marks that value down hard.
Tolerance of entrepreneurial failure
perception proxymissing- Raw value
- no data% not deterred
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (APS key indicators, fear of failure rate)
- History
- no data
Note: Stored as 100 minus the published GEM fear of failure rate, so the direction matches the rest of the registry. GEM measures that rate among adults who already see good opportunities, not among all adults, so the denominator differs from the label. Attitudinal: bankruptcy law and time to discharge would be the observable substitute and are still worth wiring beside it.
Firms through regulatory sandboxes
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no datafirms per million people
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- national regulators
- History
- no data
Note: Redefined 2026-10-02 (D152). The row asked for the number and breadth of live sandboxes, which is a policy stock: a regime can exist with nobody in it. It now counts what passes through: firms a regulator let test under relaxed rules, and firms that came out, authorised, withdrawn or failed. Regulators publish cohort lists and exit reports one by one. The evidence corpus holds 22 records against this row, most of them counts of firms admitted or exited, each on the definition and window of its own regulator, and no register assembles them on one definition (O1 triage sweep, 2026-10-01). A realistic candidate for Envisioning to build from those lists. Wireable on a register that counts admissions and completions on one definition for half the frame or more.
University spinouts
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no dataper million people
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- national TTO associations
- History
- no data
Note: Reported nationally with incompatible definitions of what counts as a spinout.
Business share of R&D
capability inputretired, see notes- Raw value
- no data% of R&D
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- OECD MSTI / RICYT
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-10-02. The only working source, OECD MSTI joined with RICYT for Latin America, covers 34 of the 53 countries then in the frame, but the row reads the make-up of a spending stock: who performs the R&D a country pays for. R&D spending itself is a condition since D122, and the share is high both where business research is large (Israel) and where total research is tiny and one firm dominates it (Thailand). State enterprises count as business, so China and Vietnam read their ownership model. UIS stopped publishing the series in 2023. Firms trying new things are read through patents, trademarks, designs and entrepreneurship instead. See D142.
Adaptability
How effectively can the system respond when circumstances change?
No trend is shown because too few indicators have values at both ends. The rows below still show the available history.
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 5.076% of labour force
- Year
- 2025. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (SL.UEM.TOTL.ZS)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 23.7% of unemployed
- Year
- 2025. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- ILOSTAT (DF_UNE_TUNE_SEX_AGE_DUR_NB)
- History
- one year
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 0.201index 0-1, lower = more diversified
- Year
- 2025. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- UNCTAD (US.ConcentDiversIndices)
- History
- one year
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 0.9% of products not exported competitively at the start
- Year
- 2024. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- Harvard Growth Lab (hs92_country_product_year_4.csv (doi:10.7910/DVN/T4CHWJ))
- History
- one year
Disaster preparedness and recovery
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no dataindex 0-100
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- INFORM / UNDRR
- History
- no data
Note: No source observes a country preparing for or recovering from a real shock. INFORM publishes its lack of coping capacity apart from hazard and exposure, but that dimension averages government self-assessments and governance perception indices with stocks such as roads, phones and physicians, which is the perception layer D23 retired plus conditions money buys (D122). Sendai and WHO reporting are governments grading themselves. A warning-reach survey item is a check candidate. See the disaster preparedness memo.
Institutional responsiveness
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no dataindex 0-100
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- none
- History
- no data
Note: No dataset exists. Measurable in principle from legislative and regulatory timestamps, which no one has assembled comparably.
Conditions, not scored
What the country has to work with on this capability. The values are shown as the source published them and are not part of the score, the confidence or the trend. The rank counts the countries with a value, best first.
Labour force participationWorld Bank (SL.TLF.ACTI.ZS), 2025
82.6 % aged 15+, rank 7 of 125. Share of the working-age population in the labour force.
A condition, not scored: how much of the population is in the labor force at all is what a country has to reallocate, a level set by norms, schooling and age, not a record of it reallocating (D141). Participation norms confound it, especially for India. Adaptability reads reallocation through long-term unemployment and export diversification instead.
Fixed broadband subscriptionsWorld Bank (IT.NET.BBND.P2), 2024
38 per 100 people, rank 20 of 125. Fixed broadband subscriptions per 100 people.
A condition, not scored: installed infrastructure is what a country has to change with, not a record of it changing (D122). Penalizes mobile-first countries such as India and South Africa.
Electricity transmission lossesWorld Bank (EG.ELC.LOSS.ZS), 2024
6.7 % of output, rank 37 of 117. Power lost in transmission and distribution, including unbilled use.
A condition, not scored: the state of the grid, and whether its operator can bill what it delivers, is infrastructure a country has to change with, not a record of it changing (D141). Read it beside broadband, the other installed network beside Adaptability.
Informal employmentILOSTAT (DF_SDG_0831_SEX_ECO_RT)
No value for this country. Informal employment as a share of total employment, SDG indicator 8.3.1.
A condition, not scored: how much work carries no contract, registration or social protection describes the labor market a country reallocates through, not it reallocating (D150). Read it beside the unemployment rate: where most work is informal, a person who loses a job takes any work within weeks, so a low rate is not a fluid market. Its direction for Adaptability cannot be defended, since informal work is both the slack that absorbs a shock and the precarity that keeps a worker from moving up, so the rank orders values and is not a verdict. Comparability is weak: the European values come from an income survey (EU-SILC) with a proxy definition, and the rest from labor force or household surveys processed by the ILO. ILOSTAT has no value for the United States, Canada, Australia, Japan, Singapore, Israel, Malaysia, China, the Philippines or Cuba, and some values are old (Haiti and Nicaragua 2012).
Evidence for missing indicators
Each record describes a case the indicators above cannot see. It does not affect the score or confidence because one case is not comparable across countries. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.
Cabinet agreed a 12-week wage subsidy on 16 March 2020, the Government announced it on 17 March, and the Ministry of Social Development paid employers on average within three and a half days of an application, paying more than NZ$13 billion across three stages by the end of December 2020.
3.5 days, average time from application to payment, 2020. 13 billion NZ$, wage subsidy paid, march to december 2020 (more than), 2020-12. Office of the Auditor-General New Zealand, Management of the Wage Subsidy Scheme (performance audit, 2021), Part 3: Making subsidy payments, retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: Cabinet approved a flat per-employee subsidy paid as a lump sum to employers, and the Ministry of Social Development ran it through its existing benefit payment systems on applicant self-declaration, with Inland Revenue data used for checks after payment.
Limits: The live OAG pages answer scripted requests with HTTP 403; the text was read on 2026-10-02 from the Internet Archive copy (https://web.archive.org/web/2026/https://oag.parliament.nz/2021/wage-subsidy/part3.htm), with the dates in Part 1 (paragraphs 1.12 to 1.13) and the 3.5 days in paragraph 3.3. The average is the Ministry of Social Development's figure as reported by the auditor, with no distribution: it does not say how long the slowest payments took. Speed was bought with a high-trust design in which applicants declared their own eligibility; by 5 March 2021 the Ministry had received 20,973 repayments worth NZ$726.2 million, about 5 percent of payments, and nearly NZ$300 million went to public organisations before decisions were made to return money. The NZ$13 billion is a spending figure, not a measure of jobs saved: the Government's estimate that the scheme indirectly supported about 1.8 million employees is not an outcome measure, and the auditor notes it could not determine with certainty how many recipients could have used other support. The audit covers the scheme to early 2021 and not the later 2021 stages.
Earthquake Commission Canterbury Home Repair Programme
New Zealand's Earthquake Commission had practically completed 66,252 home repairs under its Canterbury Home Repair Programme by 30 June 2015, after the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes damaged about 180,000 homes, missing the December 2014 completion target it had brought forward from December 2015, with about 8 to 10 percent of repairs needing additional work after completion.
66,252 repairs, repairs practically completed by the canterbury home repair programme, 2015-06-30. 40,000 homes (more than), homes repaired by june 2013, 2013-06. Office of the Auditor-General New Zealand, Earthquake Commission: Follow-up audit on the Canterbury Home Repair Programme (2015), Part 2, retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: The state natural-disaster insurer took on managed repairs itself, contracted one construction firm to project-manage tens of thousands of jobs, and paid for it from a pre-funded disaster fund and reinsurance.
Limits: The 66,252 figure, the missed December 2014 target and the 8 to 10 percent rework estimate are in Part 2 of the 2015 follow-up audit; the June 2013 figure is from the Auditor-General's 2013 overview (https://ao.parliament.nz/2013/eqc). The Auditor-General's site at oag.parliament.nz refused scripted requests and the same pages were read at ao.parliament.nz. The Auditor-General says it could not reach an overall conclusion on quality: an MBIE review reported in Part 3 of the same audit found 26 of 74 sampled EQC repairs non-compliant with the structural or durability provisions of the Building Code, and the rework rate is EQC's own estimate. Repair counts are Fletcher Construction's and EQC's figures. The programme covered homes with damage under the EQC cap; about 20,000 more expensive claims went to private insurers and are outside it. Later remedial work on repaired homes, which continued for years and generated litigation, is not quantified here.
Building
How capable is the country of turning plans and knowledge into functioning systems?
-1.3 over 10 years, from 20.0 in 2016 to 18.7 on 3 indicators seen in both years.
Trends use fewer indicators than the current score and use today's frame. A longer span reaches further back.
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 8.267% of GDP
- Year
- 2023. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (NV.IND.MANF.ZS)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 12.967% of manufactured exports
- Year
- 2024. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (TX.VAL.TECH.MF.ZS)
- History
Logistics infrastructure quality
perception proxyretired, see notes- Raw value
- no dataindex 1-5
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- World Bank (LP.LPI.INFR.XQ)
- History
- no data
Note: Retired 2026-08-26. An LPI sub-index, so the same freight-forwarder survey as logistics performance and the same problem. Electricity connection speed stays as the observable infrastructure measure in this dimension. See D23.
direct capability measureobserved
- Raw value
- 82.609score 0-100
- Year
- 2019. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (IC.ELC.TIME.DFRN)
- History
downstream outcomeobserved
- Raw value
- 0.492index
- Year
- 2024. The rail runs from 1960 to 2026.
- Normalized
- Source
- World Bank (EF.EFM.UNIV.XD)
- History
Large project delivery
direct capability measureno dataset exists, 1 record- Raw value
- no data% overrun
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- none
- History
- no data
Note: The single best measure of execution capability and there is no comparable international dataset. Assembling one is a defensible Envisioning project. Building mixes industrial output with state delivery capacity, and this indicator carries the delivery side: the other six indicators cannot see a national programme that was delivered. Documented deliveries are recorded in data/evidence and never scored, see D20.
Firm scale-up rate
direct capability measureno dataset exists- Raw value
- no data% of firms
- Year
- no data
- Normalized
- no data
- Source
- OECD DynEmp
- History
- no data
Note: OECD business dynamics work covers members irregularly. Nothing comparable for India, Brazil or South Africa.
Conditions, not scored
What the country has to work with on this capability. The values are shown as the source published them and are not part of the score, the confidence or the trend. The rank counts the countries with a value, best first.
Output per workerWorld Bank (SL.GDP.PCAP.EM.KD), 2025
87,948 constant 2021 PPP $, rank 31 of 123. GDP per person employed, constant purchasing power parity.
A condition, not scored: output per worker is income per worker, the wealth the benchmark tests capability against, so it is published beside Building as context (D122).
Evidence for missing indicators
Each record describes a case the indicators above cannot see. It does not affect the score or confidence because one case is not comparable across countries. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.
City Rail Link, Auckland, and its cost and time overrun
City Rail Link Limited, owned by the Crown and Auckland Council, achieved practical completion of Auckland's 3.45 km underground City Rail Link on 30 June 2026 against a target delivery cost of NZ$5,493 million, up from a NZ$3.4 billion estimate made in 2014, and the line opened to the public on 13 September 2026, after its company had planned completion for late 2024.
5,493 million NZ dollars, target delivery cost in the project delivery agreement, 2026-06-30. 3,400 million NZ dollars, project cost estimate made in 2014, 2014. City Rail Link Limited, Annual Report 2025/26 (accessible Word version), retrieved 2026-10-02.
How it worked: The Crown and Auckland Council set up a jointly owned delivery company, let the main stations and tunnels to an alliance, and re-baselined the budget twice as costs rose rather than cutting scope.
Limits: The NZ$5,493 million and the 30 June 2026 practical completion are in the 2025/26 annual report, a Word document; the 13 September 2026 opening is on the company's home page (https://www.cityraillink.co.nz/). The NZ$3.4 billion 2014 estimate and the 'late 2024' completion plan come from the company's cost page as archived on 26 January 2023 (https://web.archive.org/web/20230126164501/https://www.cityraillink.co.nz/city-rail-link-cost-timeline), which also gives the April 2019 revision to NZ$4.419 billion; the live page no longer carries them. The 62 percent increase over the 2014 estimate is our calculation and mixes price bases: the company attributes the 2019 rise to construction inflation, a larger contingency and a scope change for nine-car trains. Total spend to 30 June 2026 was NZ$5,283 million against approved funding of NZ$5,644 million, and the company reports itself within budget, which is true only against the 2019 and later baselines. The company is reporting on itself; no Auditor-General review of the outturn was opened. 'Started' is the year main works began, which the cited report does not state.