Too Many Universites.

New Zealand has eight universities: Otago, Canterbury, Lincoln, Massey, Victoria, Auckland, AUT, and Waikato. 

That's quite a lot of tertiary institutions for a remote, not very wealthy nation.

To put some perspective on it, New Zealand has 1 university for every 628,000 people. Australia's ratio is 1:625,000, and Canada's is around 1:185,000. However, comparisons are complicated by the inclusion of some very small private institutions and semi-independent affiliates, such as Université Sainte-Anne with an enrolment of 530.

Given the New Zealand Universities compete for students, while offering many duplicate courses that could be seen as commodities: one undergrad English course is pretty much like another.

That the current government is all about markets and management, it comes as no real surprise that there is the probability of funding cuts, as suggested in this ODT article. The cuts may be of around 4%. 

The news about scoping for a third medical school should also likely come as no real surprise: an attempt by government to improve an artificially constrained market and likely install a more politically biddable doctor production line.

However: we are not as wealthy as either Australia or Canada, so is it time for the universities to actually begin to think about collaboration and re-amalgamation to survive and prosper?