Asian New Zealanders are New Zealanders of Asian ancestry. In the New Zealand census, the term refers to a pan-ethnic group that includes diverse populations who have ancestral origins in East Asia, Southeast Asia and South Asia. Colloquial usage of Asian in New Zealand excludes Indians and other peoples of South Asian descent. Asian as used by Statistics New Zealand includes South Asians. The first Asians in New Zealand were Chinese workers who migrated to New Zealand to work in the gold mines in the 1860s. The modern period of Asian immigration began in the 1970s when New Zealand relaxed its restrictive policies to attract migrants from Asia. At the 2013 census, 471,708 New Zealanders declared that they had an Asian ancestral background. This represents about 12% of all responses. Most Asian New Zealanders live in the Auckland Region.
Demographics
There were 707,598 people identifying as being part of the Asian ethnic group at the 2018 New Zealand census, making up 15.1% of New Zealand's population. This is an increase of 235,890 people since the 2013 census, and an increase of 353,046 people since the 2006 census. Some of the increase between the 2013 and 2018 census was due to Statistics New Zealand adding ethnicity data from other sources to the 2018 census data to reduce the number of non-responses. There were 348,948 males and 358,650 females, giving a sex ratio of 0.973 males per female. Of the total population, 143,691 people were aged under 15 years, 188,235 were 15 to 29, 330,210 were 30 to 64, and 45,462 were 65 or older. At the 2018 census, 23.0% of the Asian ethnic group was born in New Zealand, up from 22.7% at the 2013 census and 20.0% at the 2006 census. Of those born in New Zealand, 64.6% were under the age of 15. Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Korean are the most commonly nominated Asian ancestries in New Zealand. Chinese New Zealanders were 4 percent of the New Zealand population and Indian New Zealanders were 3 percent of the New Zealand population. Between the 2001 and 2013 censuses, the proportion of the New Zealand population born in Asia almost doubled in size from 6.6% in 2001to 11.8% in 2013. Some cities have seen a sharper increase in Asian born population, such as Auckland where 23% of all residents were Asian in 2013.
Public opinion
The political party New Zealand First has frequently criticised immigration on economic, social and cultural grounds. New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has on several occasions characterised the rate of Asian immigration into New Zealand as too high; in 2004, he stated: "We are being dragged into the status of an Asian colony and it is time that New Zealanders were placed first in their own country." On 26 April 2005, he said: "Māori will be disturbed to know that in 17 years' time they will be outnumbered by Asians in New Zealand", an estimate disputed by Statistics New Zealand, the government's statistics bureau. Peters quickly responded that Statistics New Zealand had underestimated the growth-rate of the Asian community in the past. In April 2008, deputy New Zealand First party leader Peter Brown drew widespread attention after voicing similar views and expressing concern at the increase in New Zealand's ethnic Asian population: "We are going to flood this country with Asian people with no idea what we are going to do with them when they come here." "The matter is serious. If we continue this open door policy there is real danger we will be inundated with people who have no intention of integrating into our society. The greater the number, the greater the risk. They will form their own mini-societies to the detriment of integration and that will lead to division, friction and resentment."
