Fibre infrastructure could deliver $163 billion in economic benefits, report finds

• Fibre network could deliver $163 billion in economic benefits
• Coverage and uptake would need to improve
• Speed will be a key driver for productivity gains

A new report says the country's fibre infrastructure has the potential to deliver more than $163 billion in economic benefits over the next decade.

The research by consultancy Deloitte showed economic benefits from fibre between 2012 and 2023 was $31b due to gains in productivity, with more to come as roll out and speeds improve.

But Deloitte said for future economic benefits to be realised, fibre coverage would need to improve to 95 percent from the current 87 percent, and uptake would need to rise from the current 75 percent.

Deloitte partner Liza Van Der Merwe said "the best is actually yet to come" from fibre broadband.

"Speed would be a key driver and the mass product today is about 300 [Megabits per second] and this is expected to increase over 1 [Gigabits per second] over the next five years," she said.

Households would likely double their connected devices over the next decade, while businesses would increasingly turn to cloud computing and bandwidth-hungry applications, driving the need for "multi-gigabyte networks", Van Der Merwe said.

She said exports would benefit from improved fibre infrastructure.

"One example here is the gaming sector. Data released just yesterday is indicating this sector is a net exporter for New Zealand," Van Der Merwe said.

She said that was enabled by fibre infrastructure.

"Ultimately, the fibre network allows us to produce and consume more goods and services for the same amount of work and input."

Van Der Merwe said that translated to higher wages, profits and tax revenue.

She said fibre provided significant opportunities for further growth.

"To date, we've really only tapped into 16 percent of the productivity benefits for New Zealand. We have a future opportunity to tap into 84 percent of the productivity benefits."