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Source: ONE News -
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The Anzacs could be formed again, with a joint military taskforce planned to be established by the end of the year.
Defence Minister Wayne Mapp told Q+A's Guyon Espiner that the taskforce would include about 150 New Zealand and Australian troops.
The suggestion is still on the drawing board, with the defence ministers of both countries asking their forces to come up with a range of options.
Mapp says a White Paper looking at NZ's strategic risks and capabilities which was due at the end of March will now be released at the end of September.
He denies it is a cost cutting exercise and says while defence is receiving nearly $2 billion of new equipment that pushes up operational costs.
"We do have to be able to shift a bit of resources out from the back to the front," he says.
Mapp says the three services each have their own HR systems and completely separate training systems and the government thinks there's opportunities to join some of that up and reduce costs.
"We also think there's an opportunity for public private partnerships on the bases themselves, particularly buildings and infrastructure."
Mapp says unstable governments in the Pacific region over the last decade have been a significant challenge and there has been . a huge demand on defence forces around disaster relief.
"That tempo seems to be increasing and you're seeing throughout the world in fact that defence forces are really the first people you call on for that emergency aid, they have the range of capabilities necessary.
"In our region we are the very first people that our Pacific neighbours look to, and New Zealanders expect us to be able to respond, and we have to build some capability in that."
