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The International Monetary Fund estimated that rebuilding after the Canterbury quakes will cost about 15 billion New Zealand dollars ($11.9 billion), a heavier burden on the national economy than Japan's 1995 Kobe quake and Chile's huge temblor last year.
"While the scale of damage from the recent Japan earthquake is still uncertain, it is likely to be less than the Canterbury earthquakes as a percent of GDP," or gross domestic product, the IMF said.