New Zealand's international competitiveness has slipped

It's ranked 18th in this year's Global Competitiveness Index, down two places from 16th place last year.

We ranked first in the world for macro-economic stability, strength of institutions, lack of corruption, and the time it takes to start a business.

New Zealand also ranked highly for social capital, legal framework, intellectual property protections, and sound banking systems.

But the country performed poorly on inadequate infrastructure, regulation, research quality, capital availability and market capitalisation.