CEO drought ends at Waikato economic development agency

Te Waka aims to crank up Waikato's economic development. Photo / Supplied

Waikato economic development agency Te Waka has appointed a Fonterra senior manager as its chief executive after being without a permanent CEO for much of its four-year lifetime.

The agency, which has had an executive chairman since last year, has employed Fiona Carrick as chief executive from July.

Carrick's current job is general manager, risk at Fonterra, New Zealand's biggest business.

She has been at Fonterra in senior management roles for nearly nine years.

Executive chair Hamish Bell, who will revert to chair from July, said after an inaugural chief executive left in December 2020, after just over a year in the job, the role had been filled temporarily until Bell became executive chair in September last year.

"The decision to not appoint a CEO during that time was deliberate, allowing Te Waka to manage costs, bed in a new leadership team and to further strengthen its board," Bell said.

"With funding renewed, solid progress being made against a clear strategy and a new senior team bedded in, the board felt that Te Waka was finally in the position to attract a calibre candidate and went to market in February."

Te Waka was not planning any board changes in the near future, having refreshed its governance team after directors on the inaugural board retired last year, he said.

The agency started with a hiss and a roar in July 2018, its architects saying the Waikato region was underfunded, underperforming and underwhelming in speaking up for what it needs, but this would change.

Its aim, driven by Hamilton businessman Dallas Fisher, was to be one voice for the economic development of the country's fourth-biggest regional economy. The region has myriad small economic growth organisations.

Te Waka absorbed Waikato Means Business, a 20-year economic development strategy created with input from regional business leaders, and Waikato Innovation Park's business development functions.

Waikato, home to some of the country's most successful, wealthiest - and publicity-shy - companies and exporters, represents 8 per cent of national GDP and 38 per cent of export GDP compared to the national 27 per cent.

Independent economist Cameron Bagrie, appointed to the board last year, said as a region Waikato had outperformed the national average for the past 20 years but "it still feels like a region stuck in third gear that could offer a lot more."

While most associated with dairying (25 per cent of national milk production), the region's second-biggest earner is manufacturing, with food production contributing 60 per cent of regional exports. It's a national science and research stronghold, and was the country's fastest growing tech region in 2017 and 2018.

Money for Te Waka has always been tight.

It is dependent on local councils and a handful of loyal business sponsors for funds. In November last year Bell said its annual base funding for the next 2.5 years was just $1.1m - "enough to keep the lights on" - and that was only thanks to the Waikato Regional Council doubling its contribution.

If it adds in Government contract earnings and business donations the total annual budget could nudge $2m for the next 2.5 years, Bell said.

"If we were funded at the national (agency) average, our operating budget would be closer to $15m to $16m."

It has received $250,000 a year from local businesses and would be revisiting them and some new faces soon for a funding commitment for the next three years.

A request for Government funding last year fell on deaf ears.

Bell, a former PwC partner and director, said the recipe for Te Waka's survival is making an impact, "picking areas where we can achieve things".

Supporting development of the logistics and distribution economy was one.

Te Waka has commissioned Ernst Young to report on economic impacts and opportunities for the region in the role of central North Island freight distribution.