Wellington, Feb 23 NZPA - Profits are down but so too are costs in Fairfax Media's New Zealand publishing business and that affords chief executive Joan Withers some comfort about the worst trading conditions she has seen in 30 years in business.

Fairfax's New Zealand Publishing division reported a 29 percent fall in underlying earnings to $A58.7 ($NZ75.21) million in the six months to December 31 from a year ago on a 15 percent fall in revenue.

The result comes after TVNZ last week said it is cutting $25m of costs in response to a fall in advertising revenue and days before rival APN News & Media, publisher of the New Zealand Herald newspaper, releases its result.

Fairfax publishes nine daily, two Sunday and 60 community newspapers in New Zealand and its online assets include website stuff.co.nz. It is an owner of the New Zealand Press Association.

Ms Withers said Fairfax identified the need to cut costs early. The company announced a round of redundancies and other cost cutting measures in New Zealand last October.

Ms Withers did not signal further cost cutting, but said "we are always looking to utilise the infrastructure we have got."

"We made an early call in terms of head count reduction in October last year, but we are always looking at productivity gains and we think the way we have configured the business at the moment equips us well for what we are seeing."

The New Zealand publishing business reported a 4.4 percent reduction in costs in the six month period from a year ago.

"To actually reduce costs in that period I think was a very good result and reinforces the fact that we saw this coming early and we took early action," she said.

"We are very well positioned for any recovery," she said.

Ms Withers is not predicting when that recovery will be.

"It is pretty torrid at the moment," she said.

There was no good news in January, she said when asked about latest trading.

Fairfax has centralised the subbing of world, business and features content for its New Zealand titles but has not outsourced it.

Ms Withers would not confirm media speculation that the company is considering sharing sub editing between its Australia and New Zealand arms.

The centralising of subbing in New Zealand was working extraordinarily well, she said.

"We are delighted with the productivity we are getting out of that unit," she said.

Ms Withers does not accept the premise that newspapers are dying and points to gains in readership.

She said newspaper classified advertising was going "gang busters up until week 30 last financial year".

"I am very convinced this is a cyclical rather than a structural issue. However, we know we have to work hard to provide the sorts of advertising vehicles our customers want," she said.

The company's advertising yields in New Zealand held up well, she said.

"We are very happy with our yield performance. It is very close to last year," she said.

Circulation revenue increased 3 percent in the New Zealand publishing business.

Fairfax's online auction site TradeMe separately contributed $NZ38.2m ebitda to the Australian parent's result, up 17 percent on the same period last year.

"TradeMe remains firmly the No 1 website in New Zealand in auctions, real estate and cars," the company said.

The company said TradeMe jobs is the No 2 online employment website in New Zealand.

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