Everyone knows the government spends big. What they don't know is how unevenly that spending flows across the country.

Over 25,000 government tenders have been published on the official procurement system. Auckland alone accounts for 2,938 of them. That's nearly as many as the entire country combined gets for national contracts (3,011). Meanwhile, Northland. just up State Highway 1. has landed 1,111. (Source: MBIE, procurement)

The gap widens when you compare urban powerhouses to regional centres. Canterbury secured 2,574 tenders. Wellington, home to the public service, pulled in 2,047. But Hawke's Bay? Just 1,132. Northland sits at the bottom of the top ten regions with barely more than a third of what Auckland secured.

This isn't just about numbers on a spreadsheet. Government tenders are jobs. They're contracts for construction firms, IT providers, consultants, cleaning companies, catering operations. When your region gets 2,938 opportunities to bid for work versus 1,111, that's not a minor difference. That's the gap between a thriving supplier ecosystem and watching contracts flow past your region to somewhere else.

Auckland's dominance makes a certain sense. It's the biggest city, home to the largest concentration of suppliers, closest to the most government agencies. But nearly three times the procurement activity of regions like Northland? That reveals something about how government spending reinforces existing advantages rather than spreading opportunity.

The numbers also expose the urban-rural divide in stark terms. Bay of Plenty, with 1,307 tenders, and Manawatu-Wanganui, with 1,472, sit somewhere in the middle. They're not at the bottom, but they're nowhere near the top three. Otago, boosted by Dunedin's size and Queenstown's tourism infrastructure needs, managed 1,765. respectable, but still 1,173 fewer than Auckland.

What this data doesn't show is equally telling. How many suppliers in smaller regions never bother bidding because they assume the work will go to Auckland anyway? How many local firms have the capability but not the connections? How many regional councils are watching infrastructure money flow through to contractors based hundreds of kilometres away?

The Government Electronic Tenders Service is supposed to level the playing field. Every business, regardless of location, can see the same opportunities. But seeing an opportunity and winning it are different things. When you're competing against Auckland firms with bigger teams, longer track records, and closer relationships with procurement managers, the odds aren't even.

The procurement data tells a simple story: if you want government work, be in Auckland. If you're in Northland, you're getting less than half the opportunities. And if anyone's wondering why regional economies struggle to compete, this is part of the answer.