Wellington - New Zealand will guarantee customer deposits in banks and other financial institutions which opt into a scheme designed to shore up confidence in the current international financial crisis, the government announced on Sunday.

Finance Minister Michael Cullen said, "The scheme will cover all retail deposits of participating New Zealand-registered banks and retail deposits by locals in non-bank deposit-taking entities. This would include building societies, credit unions and deposit-taking finance companies."

Wellington - The state of the economy in New Zealand, which is officially in recession, was the key issue when the main parties formally kicked off their campaigns for next month's general election on Sunday.

Prime Minister Helen Clark, whose Labour Party has led minority coalition governments for the last nine years, moved to calm fears about the global financial crisis by announcing that she would guarantee deposits in bank savings accounts.

A fine knock of 85 by Junaid Siddique and an unbeaten 60 by skipper Mohammad Ashraful guided Bangladesh to their first win over New Zealand in a one-day international on Thursday. 

Chasing a victory target of 202 in 50 overs, Bangladesh reached their target in the 46th over with seven wickets in hand. For his match winning knock, opening batsman Siddique was named as the Man of the match. Skipper Ashraful hit five fours and a six in his 56-ball innings. He added 109-runs for the third-wicket with Siddique.

Wellington - Reserve Bank of New Zealand Governor Alan Bollard announced the implementation of new liquidity measures Thursday and resisted mounting calls to cut the official cash rate ahead of a scheduled October 23 review.

The nation's financial system "has held up relatively well" in the face of international volatility, Bollard said in a statement.

The bank was scheduled to review the interest rate on October 23.

Bollard also said the bank would temporarily broaden its security programme.

"We will, if required, be prepared to lend on the basis of fully-secured residential mortgage-backed securities, prior to those securities achieving formal ratings," he said.

Wellington, Oct 7 : Schools in New Zealand may soon encourage cellphones in the classroom, courtesy the launch of a hi-tech teaching tool, in which students text answers to teachers.

The new device, called Activexpression, enables teachers to ask questions on the board through a computer, and students can then text their answer through their Activexpression cellphone.

The software immediately produces a graph or chart on the board displaying the students'' answers, allowing teachers to gauge the class''s understanding at a glance.

A Southland Girls'' High School class has already started using the technology.

Wellington - Government accounts were "flowing" with red ink because of the worsening global financial crisis as well as higher inflation, overvalued housing and high personal debt at home, New Zealand's Treasury said Monday.

The Treasury forecast the budget deficit to widen to 3.2 billion New Zealand dollars (2 billion US dollars) in four years, up from 64 million New Zealand dollars in the current fiscal year, which ends in March, the government said at a press conference ahead of a November 8 general election.