It is time to do some quick thinking: What country comes to mind when you picture high-speed internet? It is probably safe to bet that an island nation 2,500 miles off the coast of Australia in the middle of the South Pacific did not come to mind at all. New Zealand is more known for its lush green landscapes and enormous population of sheep than it is for anything related to technology, yet it has an impressively modernized infrastructure that continues to grow due to its persistent non-interventionist stance on internet regulation.
Akamai's Q3 State of The Internet 2015 report puts NZ's average internet speed ranking at a lowly 42 on the world stage. This may not sound impressive, but it sits in sixth place when compared to other countries in the Asia Pacific region. Its average connection speed of 8.7 Mbps is deceptive, however, when you take into account that the majority of fiber infrastructure is concentrated around Auckland and Wellington. When measured separately from the rest of the country, the average speed jumps far beyond that number.
Aside from the improvements to rural communities by broadband providers such as UFB and Vodafone, established urban ISPs like Bigpipe are doubling down on the fiber frenzy by constantly upgrading their subscribers' plans to speeds that reach up to 1 Gbps. These improvements are all the more impressive when you consider the difficulties involved in improving connectivity within a nation that is separated by so many miles of ocean from its closest neighbors.
That is actually why the New Zealand government began the Rural Broadband Initiative, a $300 million project that has set a goal of blanketing most of the country with at least 5 Mbps connectivity. The project so far has seen a vast amount of improvements to mobile service delivery, with Vodafone and Spark providing 4G coverage in every single nook and cranny where they can plop an antenna.
New Zealand's position in terms of internet connectivity leaves much to be desired when compared to the zippy speeds people in Singapore and Romania experience. However, the combination of higher investment in new technologies and a rather laissez-faire approach to how the internet operates in the country make for the ingredients that would see the country become a force to be reckoned with in coming years.