Prime Minister Helen Clark this week sent out invitations to hand-picked business people to an all-day hui next month. Their task: to plan how New Zealand's economic performance can be increased.
Not before time in the eyes of the international investing community.
If there is one concern among New Zealand watchers, it is that the session will not take place until October 24.
The New Zealand dollar could slip further in the intervening period, if the Government fails to convince international credit ratings agencies, overseas portfolio investors and direct investors in the New Zealand economy that this late cosy-up to the business sector is for real. And, that the Government has not just embarked on a cosmetic window-dressing exercise.
Implementation of the business people's suggestions will be the key test to the outsiders looking in.
Those who will attend the Auckland meeting, hosted by law firm Buddle Findlay, are pleased that the Government's invitation indicates that it is prepared to involve them directly in posing solutions to our currency crisis.
Helen Clark, of course, has not worded the invitation that way. But they are in no doubt that the invitation would not have been extended if the New Zealand economy was still perceived to be in the state in which it was when the Labour/Alliance Coalition took over the Government reins.
So in a perverse way, we can all be thankful that the transformation of the kiwi into the "South Pacific peso" has achieved what business charm or logic could not - persuaded Helen Clark to get onside with business fast and to examine what steps need to happen if the international community is to be convinced that New Zealand is not an economic basket-case.
And more importantly, that it has a Government which is concerned about the dire slip in the value of the NZ dollar and is prepared to get real after a damaging months' long standoff with the business sector.
New Zealand's abysmal slip to rank 20th on the World Economic Forum's international competitiveness scale and figures confirming the outflow of 10,000 professionally qualified New Zealanders since January are just further signs to international investors that this country has lost its way.
These are the compelling realities which would have persuaded Motorola and other intending greenfields investors that New Zealand no longer offers the best haven for their investing capital.
Our current account deficit as a proportion of GDP is greater than many of the former Asian Tigers which went through the maul of the recent Asia crisis. With concerns mounting internationally that many of the Asian "survivors" may take yet another economic bath as their own deficits rise and non-performing loans are brought to account, New Zealand has little time to get its house in order if it is to escape being caught in the downstream effects of a regional down-rating.
At some point, the international investors will send out the "buy" orders again. But we are not there yet.
Two portfolio investors canvassed in Singapore last weekend indicated that they were now taking a second look at some of our "excellent" companies as the entry point was so low. The pivotal aspect here is the word company - not country.
Shares in internationally focused NZ companies, like Carter Holt Harvey and Telecom, are now cheap with the kiwi bumping along at the 42USc mark. "We just wouldn't want it to get much lower," one said.
The key issue for New Zealand is that the low kiwi positions us at the bottom of the international heap. Perception is reality in this game and it requires the Government to take strong steps to turn that perception around.
The lesson from Singapore, which went through a similar international down-rating during the Asia crisis, is to focus fast.
Pull the private sector into a partnership with the Government, make international competitiveness a priority, promote the mechanisms to drive economic success - instead of focusing on closing gaps and to diversify risk.
Philip Yeo - director of Singapore's Economic Board - puts it this way: "The Government must do whatever is necessary to ensure competitiveness. Cut costs, diversify from risky areas and build a globally attractive story."
As Mr Yeo says: "You must attract the multinational business players. If there is no globalisation, we would not exist."
New Zealand at the bottom of the Pacific could learn some useful lessons from Singapore's handling of the 1997 crisis. If New Zealand does not tackle the issues head-on, it will learn the hard way when our creditors force us to move.
Helen Clark's move is welcome.
Read more from our Herald columnists
<i>O'Sullivan</i>: Currency crisis sparks summit to find solution
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