Chinese New Zealand history dates from the goldmining era, when 12 miners came from Australia in 1865 to replace European miners in Otago.By 1868 there were over 5,000 Chinese miners in New Zealand. As the gold ran out they moved to market gardening, then to laundries and fruit shops.There were also Chinese dentists, doctors, tobacco growers, restaurant owners, carvers and gilders as well as rabbiters and sheep

station cooks.

Racism: Chinese were not always welcome in New Zealand.To reduce the number of Chinese immigrants and to ensure a ‘White New Zealand’ an entry tax was imposed. The 1881 ‘Chinese Immigrants Act’ introduced a ‘poll tax’ of £10. In 1896 the poll tax was increased to £100. Although the tax was waived from 1934, it was not repealed until 1944.An estimated 4,500 Chinese people paid the poll tax, raising over £300,000 (worth about $28 million in 2001). In 2002 the New Zealand government apologised to Chinese New Zealanders for the suffering caused by the poll tax and other legislative discrimination, the only nation to do so. Other countries had also imposed a poll tax on Chinese migrants.

Recent History: In 1987 a change in immigration policy allowed Chinese people equal opportunity to migrate to New Zealand.This was the first time since the imposition of the poll tax.The resulting change was dramatic. Pre-1987 the Chinese New Zealand population consisted of 25,000 people, the majority of whom were sometimes referred to as ‘poll tax descendants.’ Post-1987 the majority of Chinese New Zealanders are from urban areas and mostly speak Mandarin. In the 2006 census there were 147,570 people listed as Chinese New Zealanders.