Bad news for those plan to migrate to NZ
Basically you need to get a job offer or previously you study in NZ university to get 160 points...
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It will now be tougher for would-be migrants to gain residency under the skilled migrant and family sponsored categories.
Immigration Minister Michael Woodhouse today announced that fewer residence approvals would be planned for the next two years, with levels down to 85,000-95,000 from 90,000-100,000.
The number of points required for residence will also be raised from 140 to 160 points under the Skilled Migrant Category and the number of places for the capped family categories would be reduced to 2000 per year from 5500.
Last year, 52,052 were granted residency, up from 43,085 the previous year.
The changes were made following a review of the Government's New Zealand Residence Programme (NZRP).
The programme sets a planning range for the total number of people approved residence over a multi-year period, and determines the proportion of residence places allocated to the different residence streams.
"Increasing the points required to gain residence from 140 to 160 will moderate the growth in applications in the Skilled Migrant Category and enable us to lower the overall number of migrants gaining residence," Woodhouse said.
"Changes to the Family Category, including temporarily closing the Parent Category to new applications, will also reduce the total number of migrants being granted residence."
Around half of those approved under the residence programme came through the skilled migrant category.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article....jectid=11726742