The Design Taskforce's report - Success by Design - which sets out our strategy to enable New Zealand's businesses to use design to become more internationally competitive, was made public this week.
The Design Taskforce's report - Success by Design - which sets out our strategy to enable New Zealand's businesses to use design to become more internationally competitive, was made public this week.
The release of the report, and its presentation to Government, marks the start of an exciting and challenging time for the New Zealand design profession.

As a Taskforce we were focused on how design can make a real contribution to the commercialisation of innovation, and the consequent boost to economic growth.

So rather than focus on the design industry itself, we developed a strategy to improve the international competitiveness of growth and export-orientated New Zealand businesses.
We set ourselves three goals:
- Ensuring more New Zealand businesses achieve a sustainable international competitive advantage
- Creating a more capable, business savvy design community
- Getting greater international recognition of New Zealand design

To meet these objectives, the Taskforce has over the last year developed a five-year programme that starts with gaining design industry and business support and securing government funding. The programme builds on this momentum through proposed initiatives such as a design conference, design mentoring, design ambassadors and a design resource directory.

We have also recommended that a Design Reference Group be established to guide the implementation of the strategy and give ongoing advice to government on design's role as a business enabler.

For our strategy to succeed, it must be equally owned by the design profession and the business community.

Please read our report and give us your feedback (details at the end).
Our report represents a great opportunity for New Zealand's design community, which contains so much world-class talent, to help grow New Zealand's exports by making our products and services more internationally competitive.
The Design Industry Taskforce
Ray Labone, Designworks (Chair), Richard Cutfield - Pencarrow Private Equity, Mary Davy - Maxim Group, Neville Findlay - Zambesi, Professor Simon Fraser- Victoria University of Wellington, Peter Haythornthwaite - CreativeLab Limited, Michael James - UNITEC & the Designers Institute of NZ, Bina Klose - Shape Design, Jeremy Moon - Icebreaker Clothing, Professor John Raine - University of Canterbury, Henare Walmsley - Opus International Consultants, Rick Wells - Formway, Professor Leong Yap - Massey University

Taskforce convened by Hon Jim Anderton, Minister for Industry & Regional Dev.

For more information on the Taskforce, and to download a copy of the report, visit www.industrytaskforces