Longitudinal Immigration Survey New Zealand
Te ara o nga manene
The survey is being developed in partnership by:
What is it?
How will the information from the survey be used?
What information will we ask about?
What happens if I am chosen for the survey?
Testing the survey
Key tasks over the next six months
Important information
Further information
Links of interest
What is it?
The Longitudinal Immigration Survey: New Zealand (LisNZ) is a survey of new migrants to New Zealand. About 8,000 migrants will be asked questions about their New Zealand settlement experience.
How will the information from the survey be used?
The Department of Labour wants to find out about migrants' settlement experiences.
The information collected will help the Department of Labour:
- assess the effectiveness of current immigration policy
- determine whether the Government's objectives are being met
- find out about the initial settlement experiences of different groups of new migrants in New Zealand, and
- learn about what helps or disrupts the settlement of migrants in New Zealand.
- The information from the survey will also be available for community groups and organisations that work with, or provide services for, migrants. This information will assist these groups to develop services that help migrants.
What information will we ask about?
The survey questions are about all aspects of settling in a new country.
For example, if we interview you we will ask questions about:
- your experience of finding suitable housing and work in New Zealand
- how satisfied you are with the housing and work you have found
- what sort of assistance or services you have used - for example, contacting government agencies
- your reasons for coming to New Zealand
- your experience of the New Zealand education system
- how satisfied you are with your life in New Zealand.
What happens if I am chosen for the survey?
The survey will begin in 2004. A Statistics New Zealand interviewer will visit the people chosen to take part in this survey in their home and ask them the survey questions. This will happen three times over three years. Results from the survey will be progressively released from early 2007.
Testing the survey
Statistics New Zealand recently conducted the second part of a practice survey for the Longitudinal Immigration Survey: New Zealand (LisNZ) . The second part of the practice survey took place during July and August 2002 and approximately 500 respondents were interviewed. The respondents for the practice survey were chosen at random from migrants (excluding refugees) aged 16 years and over who had settled in specific areas within New Zealand, spoke at least one of a given set of languages, and had arrived in or were approved for permanent residence in New Zealand within a specified period. Temporary visitors, illegal migrants and all people from Australia, Niue, the Cook Islands and Tokelau were excluded from the practice survey.
The primary objectives of the practice survey were to trial the electronic questionnaire and the proposed survey methodology. The selected respondents were asked a range of questions on such topics as:
- their experience of finding housing and work in New Zealand
- their health status and use of health services
- their educational qualifications and current study, and
- their satisfaction with life in New Zealand.
- The data from the practice survey will be used to refine the questionnaire and the survey methodology to be used for the main survey, which is scheduled to begin in 2004.
For further information contact Judith.Marbeck@stats.govt.nz.
Key tasks over the next six months
Over the next six months, the project team will be:
- finalising the questionnaire for the survey and preparing translations of the questionnaire
- finalising the selection system and methods
- finalising the contact systems
- updating key users on progress of the survey
Important information
If you are chosen to take part in the survey, Statistics New Zealand is the only government department who will contact you. The New Zealand Immigration Service will not know who takes part in the survey, and they will not be given any personal information about you.
Taking part in this survey does not affect your approval for residence in New Zealand. Also, the answers that you provide in the survey will not change the services that are offered to you in New Zealand and will not change your status in the New Zealand community.
Further information
If you require any more information, please send an email to lisnz@stats.govt.nz
If you are in New Zealand, you can call us free on 0800 633 644.
The following links may be of interest:
Information for respondents which provides information for people who are chosen to take part in some of our surveys, including your rights to privacy and how to obtain further information.
Information about New Zealand's Official Statistical System - This link gives additional information about the official statistics we collect. There is also information about the Statistics Act 1975 and joint collections.
A report prepared by the Department of Labour: Migrants' Experiences of New Zealand - Summarising information from the LisNZ Pilot Survey.
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This page last modified on: 01 May 2003