Wellington came to a virtual standstill on the first day of the nationwide lockdown on March 26.

ANALYSIS: Every corner of the New Zealand economy is affected by coronavirus. It was the case before the Government announced the shutdown of all non-essential businesses this week and it is certainly the case now.

But while most sectors are reeling from crashing demand and, in some instances, the crashing supply of materials, this is not universally the case.

Food production and processing, crucial manufacturing, such as respirators made by Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, and telecommunications are all examples of businesses and sectors that are bucking the trend.

A look at the important sectors of New Zealand's economy certainly shows wide vulnerability to the long, deep recession economists now fear is coming. But there is resilience too.

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123RF The service industry was among the first as a result of travel restrictions. (File photo)

SERVICE SECTOR

Comprised of a wide range of business, the service sector represents the bleeding edge of the Covid-19 coronavirus economic shock.

Many of the industries at its heart are reliant on tourists and were among the first to suffer as both foreign governments and the New Zealand Government began banning and restricting international travel in January.

SUPPLIED Air New Zealand will receive a $900 million loan from the Government to help the national airline survive the crisis.

TOURISM:

From car and campervan rentals to attractions like Hobbiton, tourism is suffering a punishing double blow.

It is currently shuttered entirely by both domestic and global measures to stop the spread of coronavirus. And if a long, deep global recession takes hold it will continue to suffer for years to come, as people cut discretionary spending on pleasures like travel.

At this point it also remains unclear whether in the aftermath of the coronavirus people will remain as willing as previously to make long-haul flights to the bottom of the world.

It also remains profoundly unclear how many airlines and scheduled flights there will be to carry them.

Stats NZ reports that tourism expenditure was $40.9 billion for the year to March 2019, the last full year for which it has figures.

It directly employed some 229,000 people and constituted the country's biggest export industry.

All we know for certain is that 2020 will devastate those numbers.

KELLY HODEL/STUFF Tourism employed some 229,000 people and constituted the country's biggest export industry. (File photo)

TRAVEL:

Travel has huge overlap with tourism and the two industries' struggles are tightly intertwined.

Air travel is all but mothballed, with international routes either already suspended or ending imminently.

The Government has offered Air New Zealand, the national flag carrier, convertible debt funding of up to $900 million and it is conceivable that the carrier is completely nationalised as a result of the current recession.

The return of business travel is as uncertain at this point as the return of leisure travel. Deep recessions put severe restraints on business spending.

The tour operators and travel agents that survive the shutdown will struggle to stay solvent in a prolonged recession, as households and businesses cut discretionary spending.

Cruise companies are likely to suffer especially, with the added burden of public aversion following the virulent spread of disease on their ships.

Joseph Johnson Bars and restaurants were among the first to be forced to close their doors as the country went in to lockdown. (File photo)

HOSPITALITY:

Bars, cafes and restaurants, already hit by the drop in the number of travellers, and by the Government's early social distancing rules, have entered a period of complete shutdown

Many had hoped that takeaway food service would be included as an essential service. It is not.

As with tourism, the sector is likely to suffer a huge wave of bankruptcies, as many operators report they have insufficient cash to weather the total shutdown now upon them, despite the network of government help that includes wage support for employees and loan guarantees.

Last year, some 130,000 people worked in hospitality, more than half of them in restaurants and bars.

Hotels are similarly exposed to the emergency shutdown and the broader hit to both travel and tourism. The industry faces not only a short-term black hole in revenue, but what is likely to be a prolonged struggle to recover.

MONIQUE FORD/STUFF Retail spending is likely to contract as households conserve cash and increasingly struggle with rising unemployment. (File photo)

RETAIL:

Retailers will weather the storm with mixed results.

Food and consumer goods are considered counter-cyclical businesses, they are among the least affected in recessions.

Supermarkets, including Countdown, Foodstuffs, the cooperative that owns Pak 'n Save and New World has clearly seen a large rise in their business as consumers stock up on staples including toilet paper, pasta, flour and tinned goods, and generally fill their pantries against the emergency.

Deemed essential services under the Government rules, food retailers are also about to enjoy a further boost, since restaurants and takeaway options are now closed.

The story for a host of other retailers will be very different.

Small retailers are highly exposed to lost tourist revenue, as are those which sell luxury goods.

Those with well developed online channels will be best able to weather this recession, especially as it now entails a period of shuttered storefronts.

Retail spending, beyond food and consumer staples, is likely to contract as households conserve cash and increasingly struggle with rising unemployment.

LUZ ZUNIGA/STUFF Harvesting of grapes, apples and kiwifruit has been allowed to continue through the lockdown period. (File photo)

PRIMARY SECTOR

AGRICULTURE:

Primary food production as well as processing suddenly looks like the most solid pillar of New Zealand's private sector.

Not only have the Government's new and extraordinary rules prioritised its continued operation through the most severe alert level of coronavirus, many countries have concurrently made a priority of food imports.

That means our exports can broadly continue. There have been pockets of difficulty like "supply chain slowness" for some meat exporters who had a hard time getting enough cold storage shipping containers for their goods to move to Asia, especially when China was in the worst throes of its shutdown.

And individual products like rock lobsters were pummelled when traditional buying for Chinese New Year evaporated.

It is also likely that new logistics problems will emerge for large export markets to which the coronavirus has spread, including the United States, Europe and Britain.

Despite those troubles, food prices, though softening, have held up quite well.

Harvests have been allowed to continue through emergency lockdown measures: the picking of grapes, apples and kiwifruit are all under way.

And the production of wine and beer carry on alongside the growing, harvest and processing of all supermarket foodstuffs.

The vast majority of this food remains bound for export markets and may well constitute the country's single largest source of foreign currency this year.

DOMINICO ZAPATA/STUFF The $7 billion forestry industry employs 35,000, many whom will lose their jobs.

FORESTRY:

Stalled Chinese buying and closed or partly closed ports in January and February brought trouble in the New Zealand forestry industry to a head.

But things were tough before that. A large volume of storm and beetle-damaged European logs was already cutting into New Zealand's share of the Chinese market.

Discounted fire-damaged logs from Australia were also expected to weigh on prices.

The industry brought in nearly $7b in export revenue last year, roughly half came from logs and the remainder from wood products. It employed 35,000 Kiwis.

Both of those figures are likely to be significantly diminished in 2020.

SUPPLIED Fisher & Paykel Healthcare is ramping up production as global demand for its respiratory products spikes. (File photo)

MANUFACTURING

New Zealand manufacturing is a mixed bag.

Some areas will hold up well. As discussed earlier, food and related packaging is currently considered essential and allowed to continue operating.

Since most of our manufacturing is for food and beverages, it's expected to be generally resilient in recession.

In some rare areas, production is actually increasing. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare says it is ramping up Auckland-based manufacturing as global demand for its respiratory products spikes.

And the unsung heroes of loo-roll production have also put their shoulders to the wheel, cranking up production.

Stats NZ rolls petroleum refining into manufacturing. This will drop considerably. Demand for refined products like petrol and jet fuel will plummet though the current shutdown, and remain slow through a broader economic slump.

123RF New house building is expected to slow as employment and migration ebbs away.

CONSTRUCTION

Large commercial building projects rely on hundreds of millions and sometimes billions of dollars in upfront capital investment.

This is typically considered nervous money that is unavailable in economic slumps. In addition, the backdrop may soon look like a hugely troubled existing commercial property market, as vulnerable retail and other tenants disappear.

Fletcher Building, the country's largest publicly traded construction firm, has cancelled its April dividend to preserve cash and abandoned its previously issued financial guidance.

On the residential side of the industry, growth in new home construction requires strong employment. It helps if that is coupled with healthy migration numbers.

Both of these conditions are disappearing quickly. The industry employs roughly 250,000 Kiwis directly.

The one bright spot for them is that the Government's promised bump in infrastructure spending is expected to flow through to hiring by late this year or early next.

KELLY HODEL/STUFF Healthcare is expanding, with the Government recalling as many retired nurses and doctors as possible to care for what it fears will be a wave of patients with coronavirus. (File photo)

HEALTH AND EDUCATION

Both health and education fall broadly under the umbrella of the public sector and to that degree are sheltered from recession.

That said, schools, private ones especially, have benefited enormously over the last decade from rising numbers of foreign students.

That cohort is likely to shrink if a global recession results from the current economic shutdown.

Tertiary institutions, universities particularly, are already suffering significantly as travel bans which began early this year prevented many Chinese international students from arriving to begin their studies.

Outsized foreign fees are a large part of university budgets and the prospect of their loss over the medium to long run would spell job cuts.

As a counter-weight, education and training often proves resilient in recession as wide unemployment favours retraining.

Healthcare is expanding at the moment, with the Government recalling as many retired nurses and doctors as possible to care for what it fears will be a wave of patients with coronavirus, though hospitalised cases are currently in the single digits.

The largest group within the sector are nurses. Last year there were roughly 55,000. If there is any safe sector in which to work through the current recession, healthcare is likely to be it.

That said, there are areas of nervousness.

Retirement villages are vulnerable to a fall in house prices. This would deter older customers from selling up and moving, particularly those considering moving to a self-contained unit who can choose their timing.

GETTY-IMAGES Telecommunications companies are benefiting from unprecedented demand as people work from home.

TELECOMMUNICATIONS

Companies that provide the infrastructure for data transmission and communications, including wireless and cellphone service, are currently in an enviable position.

The huge number of people working from home has produced unprecedented demand. And a resulting long-term shift to more flexible or home-based working may well embed this.

Representing roughly 12,000 jobs it's not a big employer but it's considered one of the safest.