No rush to cash in on Australian racial tensions

Hamilton's tertiary institutes regularly recruit Indian students but say they won't be amping up their efforts to take advantage of racial tensions between the Indian and Australian Governments.

Their comments come as recent assaults on Indian students in Australia caused an outcry in India and soured relations between the two countries. One vicious attack proved fatal.

While Wintec internationalisation director Stewart Brougham conceded this could see more Indian students look to New Zealand to study, neither Wintec or Waikato University would be playing on that factor to get more students to their campuses.

"Certainly students that would have gone to Australia may now be thinking of `where else would I like to go'," Mr Brougham said.

"We're are obviously hopeful through our marketing initiatives that they may consider New Zealand and Wintec, but we don't want to set up a situation where we are being seen to be profiting from the situation in Australia."

Mr Brougham said Indian students already made up 30 per cent of international enrolments, mostly post graduate enrolments in business and IT.

"We have a relatively consistent marketing strategy in India and our international marketing manager goes to India three times a year. We will continue to do that."

Waikato University spokeswoman Lisa Finucane also said they'd been actively engaging with the Indian market for some time. The number of Indian students at Waikato had grown in recent years.

Mr Brougham said Australia was one of their main competitors and they were watching the situation with India and Australia closely.

But New Zealand had its own perks to attract potential students and didn't need to play on tensions between India and Australia.

- © Fairfax NZ News