New Zealand's oldest immigrant has arrived in his new home country.

102-year-old Eric King-Turner and his Kiwi-born wife Doris, 88, will set up a new home in his wife's hometown of Nelson where he intends to indulge his passion for fly fishing.

"I'm delighted to be here. My wife lived with me for 13 years in Britain so I thought she might be getting homesick."

"It's a wonderful new adventure and I would say to anyone that if you want to do something you should do it straight away while you can. What's important is that when I'm 105 I don't want to be thinking 'I wish I had moved to the other side of the world when I was 102'."

Meanwhile the 101-year-old widower who had his application to emigrate to New Zealand declined has been granted residency after intervention from New Zealand Immigration Minister Clayton Cosgrove, who asked immigration officials to take another look at the man's case.

The widower, a retired research chemist who has been living with his English-born New Zealand-resident son since 2006, was refused residency on a technicality - his son hadn't lived here for the required minimum 184 days in each of the three years before his application was made.

Mr Cosgrove said both he and Associate Immigration Minister Shane Jones had discretion to ask officials to look again at exceptional cases referred to them. Ministerial intervention was rarely used and only in exceptional circumstances.