Are we really back to normal!
It has just been little over a week since Prime minister Jacinda Ardern announced last Monday that New Zealand is moving to threat alert Level-1 in wake of pandemic Covid-19. If we look at last one week’s momentum in the country including the nation’s best commonly loved sport, rugby matches turnout in Dunedin and later in Auckland, you must feel proud of great Kiwi resilience.
In Auckland on a Sunday afternoon, the Blues played against Hurricanes beating them by 10 points in front of a full house crowd of 43,000, the largest in 15 years at Eden Park. The similar enthusiasm was witnessed a day before in Dunedin in the match between Highlanders and Chiefs.
The Mayors of both Auckland and Dunedin were present at the respective venues among the crowd of thousands to cheer the teams and to boost the morale of the crowds where Auckland Mayor rightly said that the match was a celebration of the return of normality. New Zealand is already making waves across the globe for the way we have handled Covid-19 and defeated it convincingly and these matches have taken us one notch further to prove that we took a right approach in right direction.
In fact, by broadcasting the matches live across Australia and other places, we showcased the world how successfully New Zealand has dealt with Covid-19. These matches actually have helped greatly in changing the atmosphere within the community and will have huge impact in local hospitality and entertainment sector. Country has been through some really rough times in past 2-3 months and it badly needed a dose of such events to boost the morale of communities and what could be a better way to do it other than organising rugby matches, the most favourite sport of Kiwis.
As we know that we are exactly three months away from the elections in New Zealand on 19th September, so all these steps become imminent to restore normalcy and bring back a sense of confidence among people. New Zealanders are aware of the challenges lying ahead of them once the government’s wages subsidy support ends at the end of this month.
Traditionally Kiwis are known to be a resilient race who always try to punch above their weight. The current stamping out of Covid-19 crisis is a classic example of it but a bigger crisis i.e. the economic crisis is looming, giving the government more serious challenges to tackle. With the government coffers almost empty after supporting businesses and communities during the crisis period, the productivity has taken a back seat. To stimulate the economy government will need to take some really bold and innovative measures like allowing some unconventional industries to start and grow in New Zealand which so far have been denied entry in New Zealand, mining being the topmost.
While we need a clean, green and pollution free New Zealand, at the same time we also need to find new avenues to generate employment. The welfare societies supported by government funding cannot sustain for very long and for a healthy and vibrant community and economy it is a must to have more and more people in the workforce.
The worst hit industries of New Zealand tourism & hospitality need the biggest support not only from the government but also from local Kiwis to give a boost to local tourism until the situations are completely normalised in rest of the world and foreign tourists start arriving in the country. When this actually starts happening that should be time, when we can proudly claim that we are back to normal and we are doing well.
-Yugal Parashar