The country’s quartet of major developments – the offshore Pohokura and Kupe gas-condensate projects, and the Tui Area and Maari oil projects – together with active onshore and offshore exploration programs means there has never before been such a demand for skilled energy workers in New Zealand.

The shortage prompted the industry to act late this year.

PEPANZ held two meetings with interested industry executives in New Plymouth and Wellington recently and is now spending $NZ50,000 ($A43,500) on an industry-wide survey to quantify the personnel shortage. It is then likely to spend another $NZ25,000 developing a training and recruitment program.

PEPANZ executive officer John Pfahlert said there was no quick fix for the personnel shortage.

“I have no real idea how many more people we will need over the coming years; it’s all crystal ball stuff at present," he said.

"We hope to be able to quantify that figure when our initial survey has been completed in, say, late April.

“Survey completion, then getting industry financial support to run programs that will attract people into the sector – these will be the top priorities for PEPANZ. And I see this as a 3-10 year plan.”

Pfahlert said New Zealand would need people from overseas, as well as locally trained personnel, for the next few years. The difficulty was that other countries were also trying to recruit worldwide and New Zealand could lose good workers to overseas projects paying higher wages.