Australian wage growth has slumped to the lowest pace in at least 17 years against the backdrop of a deteriorating labour market

A controversial bid to mine an area of seabed off the North Island's west coast has met a backlash, with only a handful of several thousand submissions in support of the plan.

A New Zealander has died in an underground rockfall accident at an Australian mine.

Prime Minister John Key has defended his Government's $30 million payout to the owners of the Tiwai Point aluminium smelter after the Greens and Labour said parent company Rio Tinto's US$3.7 billion profit showed the payment was unjustified.

Profits are up 10pc at world mining giant Rio Tinto - in a year where NZ taxpayers paid the company $30m to keep the Tiwai Pt smelter open.

Ngapuhi working in Australia's mines are being told they won't be welcome if they come home to carry out controversial mineral exploration in Northland.

OceanaGold plans to scale back its operations and is expected to axe more than 100 jobs at the Macraes goldfield in Otago in response to a falling gold price.

Australia's largest gold miner is facing a class action from shareholders over its massive financial writedown.

The Australian budget bottom line is looking bleak, and a weaker economy isn't going to help the situation.

Officials in New Zealand's leading oil and gas region are rejecting claims that cows are being allowed to graze on land polluted by waste from mining and fracking operations.

Wellington Zoo is making a home for four Tasmanian Devils which are due to arrive there this week.

A 'funeral procession' for New Zealand's endangered Maui's dolphin species is currently winding though Wellington's inner city streets.

Deep-sea oil drilling interests claim our Government could receive $300m from it. Is our "clean, green reputation" worth trading in for that, Matt McCarten asks.

Anti-mining groups in Northland are planning to block State Highway 1 for two hours today in a protest against an Australian exploration company's plans to begin prospecting for gold and silver.

Ian Young, the manager of corporate services at Grey District Council, says donations to the Pike River Disaster Relief Trust came to $8,065,727.

By November 18, 2010, there was just enough progress at Pike to reassure some workers that the operation could yet be a success, but not enough to ease the dark fears held by others.

Miners in Waihi will be out of work for several months' next Christmas before Newmont Waihi Gold's controversial Correnso mine starts production.