Investing in the long term: our strategic result areas
The new priorities mean a change in focus for the Treasury. The four strategic result areas (SRAs) agreed in 2007 remain important areas of work; and they still offer the potential to deliver the greatest benefits to long-term productivity and sustainability once through the crisis. These are areas where we will have greatest impact, are best able to meet Ministerial expectations and fill current gaps. They are, of course, only part of our full work programme, which will depend on the state of the economy and other critical factors in our external environment. The symbols in the diagram on pages 10 and 11 show the areas of work that contribute to these priorities within our broad portfolio.
The four SRAs are:
- long-term fiscal sustainability, in particular, advising on the options for managing long-term fiscal challenges and for promoting an understanding of long-term fiscal issues
- increased economic benefits to New Zealand in full through developing international connections
- improved natural resource management to ensure a sound basis for sustainable and productive economy, and
- achieving a substantive increase in the contribution to New Zealand's economic growth and living standards through a focus on its collective skills base and the skillsthat are needed for improved future economic performance.
The Treasury's focus on these SRAs is important for the long-haul; however, over the next 12 to 18 months we will focus primarily on assisting the Government to understand and respond to the economic crisis, while foregoing some of this longer-term investment work. In the context of delivering on immediate priorities, we will continue to identify and respond to opportunities that have the potential to provide benefits to long-term productivity and sustainability.
To ensure that we continue to optimise our impact and focus on the right things at the right time, we will reassess the focus and the balance of our strategic approach midway through the period covered by the SOI. We aim to resume our previous investment in longer-term SRA work toward the latter part of this SOI term.
