New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bill English said on Friday that Chinese investors were starting to eye New Zealand again as an investment destination, including for share floats by state-owned firms, and that he believes the New Zealand public is becoming more pragmatic about Chinese investment.

"They've got an ongoing anxiety under the surface but they are pretty pragmatic about what it is going to take to keep jobs and incomes," the New Zealand Herald quoted him as saying.

The minister said he believed there was also a consensus that the level of Chinese investment was very low, despite the concerns over the recent purchase of 16 Crafar farms in receivership by China's Shanghai Pengxin.

"If you ask anyone to name a Chinese investment apart from Crafar farms, they can't -- that's because there is hardly any," he said.

He made a pitch to attract investment to New Zealand and said there was plenty of interest in the Christchurch reconstruction, green fields investment in food production, specialized businesses that could be grown back into the Asian region and the imminent partial share floats.

"We are a destination they haven't thought about for a while and they are now starting to think about us," he added.



Earlier this month, infant formula giant Yashili International Holdings received approval for a 212-million-NZ dollar milk- processing plant planned for Pokeno, south of Auckland, to become the latest Chinese player to invest in the New Zealand dairy industry.