ANZ economists are tipping resources investment to decline by 3-4 per cent by the middle of the year

ANZ economists are tipping resources investment to decline by 3-4 per cent by the middle of the year. We continue to expect that investment within the resources sector will decline sharply from mid 2014, as a number of projects in the mining sector are finished and as construction on the first few mega-LNG projects winds down. We expect resources investment to decline by 3-4 per cent of GDP over the next few years with around half of this impacting on domestic activity. As the investment phase of the resources boom winds down, the production phase will ramp up, they said, adding that Australian iron ore production is expected to increase to 685 million tonnes in 2015 from 550 million tonnes in 2013, with LNG output ramping up from 2015 onwards.