NEW ZEALAND TO REPAY UP TO 600 MLN DLRS OF DEBT
New Zealand will repay a portion of
its 42.48 billion N.Z. Dlr public debt for the first time since
1952 as a result of a 379 mln N.Z. Dlr budget surplus for
fiscal March 1988, Finance Minister Roger Douglas said.
    Douglas said in a budget statement the surplus is the first
achieved in New Zealand in 35 years. It compared with a 1.95
billion dlr deficit in fiscal 1987.
    Douglas said this year's government bond tender program
would be adjusted in the light of the surplus, providing for
the repayment of up to 600 mln dlrs of New Zealand's 21.74
billion dlrs of overseas debt.
    Details of which loans will be repaid have still to be
decided.
    Douglas said the present scale of the public debt was
massive.
    "It will take many years to reduce the debt to an acceptable
level," he said.
 REUTER
