Review of socio-economic & environmental impacts of population, resettlement, and migration in Niue 10 March, 1999 / compiled by Chalapan Kaluwin...[et al.]

The same macro-economic factors which stimulated the depopulation of remote rural towns in New Zealand—or Nebraska—apply to Niue. Niueans, having received an academic education that is more focused on the kinds of work and life found in urban New Zealand than on those found in rural Niue, and having been encouraged to prefer desk work to physical work, are not adequately equipped for identifying, creating, and earning livelihoods in Niue. If Niue's population declines to the point where it is no longer viable as an independent society, then it could become a cultural park; the costs to New Zealand of maintaining that cultural park are likely to exceed current expenditures.