Road Freight Survey To Fill Key Knowledge Gaps

Registrations for the National Road Freight Survey have opened today (February 14) with company owners, managers, drivers and other essential staff encouraged to have their say in the largest sector snap-shot in more than a decade.

The survey is being run by independent research firm Research NZ on behalf of Transporting New Zealand, and is available to all road freight industry participants.

Transporting New Zealand Chief Executive Dom Kalasih says the survey is a fantastic opportunity to better understand industry attitudes on key issues including workforce shortages, operating conditions, revenue issues such as tolling and congestion charging, the Cook Strait ferries and road policing.

"There are over 30,000 people working in the road freight sector across more than 4,000 business entities, carrying 93 percent of the national freight task," Kalasih says.

"We want to get a clearer picture of what their leading concerns are, what opportunities they see for improvement, and what might be lesser priorities."

He says he is particularly interested in sharing the results with policy makers and industry partners about the retirement intentions of drivers and the employment of migrant workers.

"We know the average age of truck drivers is rapidly approaching 60, and that migrant truck drivers have played an important supplementary role in filling shortages. However, the survey will give us a clearer picture of what proportion of the workforce intends to retire within five years, what the main barriers are to employing new drivers, and what policy changes we need to prioritise to improve the situation."

Kalasih says that Research NZ has kept the survey short, multi-choice and accessible, with the option to provide more in-depth answers.

"The survey will ask operators to rank leading industry issues in order of importance, and then get more detailed responses on topical issues relating to each of those. This will be followed by some key questions on workforce challenges, the public perception of truck drivers, and what (if any) skill gaps people are noticing with new drivers."

"Because of the importance of the road freight industry, and its fragmented nature, people get a lot of survey requests from government, suppliers and supply chain partners. That’s why we’ve ensured this survey is concise, while still being comprehensive. We got feedback from our members on the content and it’s been designed to ensure we’ve got it right."

"People who register for the survey before 3 March (the survey launch date) will also enter the draw for an iPad, and there will be more prizes to follow. So get registered and share it with your team today. It’s open to all industry participants."

Road freight business owners, managers, drivers and staff can pre-register for the survey at:

https://tinyurl.com/NZSurvey2025

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