By SIMON COLLINS
New Zealand's boatbuilding industry has reached another high, with 20 super-yachts worth $300 million under construction.
The biggest yacht so far built here, the $40 million, 53m ketch Salperton, was launched by Alloy Yachts at Henderson yesterday and will tie up in Auckland's Viaduct Harbour today.
The yacht will undergo
sea trials until its buyer, described only as "a successful European businessman", arrives to take delivery next month.
It caps a remarkable year. Super-yacht exports grew from $66 million in the year to last March to an estimated $150 million in the year ending next March.
Alloy Yachts managing director Tony Hambrook said Alloy alone was building yachts worth $88 million.
The value of boatbuilding business had grown by 20 per cent a year for the past seven years at Alloy, and for the past four years nationally.
Trade NZ marine account manager Nicole Tipler said the industry employed 6000 people - 80 per cent of them in Auckland and the rest mainly in Whangarei, New Plymouth and Christchurch.
Mr Hambrook said Salperton's launch was not the peak.
"We are about to start a boat in February that is even bigger," he said.
The 54m yacht, ordered by an American businessman, would be 15 per cent larger than Salperton in volume.
Salperton has a galley of restaurant quality to cater for the 11 crew and 11 guests. Guests have en-suite bathrooms fitted with marble.
Alloy's staff has grown from 50 to 250 in seven years, but Mr Hambrook said he would try to "settle down and bed in" his current workers before expanding further.
"For the industry generally, the constraint is the number of trained staff available," he said.
Industry NZ has given $200,000 to the Boating Industry Association to fill the skill gap and prepare a "vision statement". The money has been used partly to retrain 54 people from other trades.
Employers have almost doubled apprentices in the industry from 218 in June last year to just on 400.
Mr Hambrook said he met Salperton's buyer in Florida, where Alloy has just won the International Super-yacht Society award for "best sail 36m and over" at one of the world's top boat shows.
Salperton's vital statistics
Length: 53m (174 ft)
Displacement: 392 tons
Height of main mast: 58.46m
Crew: 9-11
Guests: 10
Designer: Dubois Naval Architects, England
Builder: Alloy Yachts International, Auckland, NZ
Owner: Barry Houghton (England)
Charter rate: US$175,000/week
Website: www.salpertonyacht.com
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