Rural telecommunications in New Zealand

Fibre passes around 87 percent of New Zealand households, most of them in urban areas. The remaining 13 percent are rural, but this is an arbitrary distinction.

This group includes everything from remote high-country stations to lifestyle blocks just minutes from major cities.

New Zealand is both sparsely populated and highly urbanised. Outside urban centres there are vast tracts of the interior that are dominated by rugged mountain ranges and agricultural land.

Here the population...