Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Catherine Beard: Business NZ Advocacy Director on the potential impact of US tariffs on NZ exporters

Transcript

Catherine Beard: Business NZ Advocacy Director on the potential impact of US tariffs on NZ exporters · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Time for the second good news story of the day.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: The US is our second largest export market. It overtook Australia.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: China is now number one. Katherine Beard joins me now.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: She is the advocacy director for Export New Zealand. How
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: are Catherine?
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Good morning?
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: So what drove it up? What spiked it over Australia?
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: What's working? What are we selling?
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Look? A lot of it's been driven actually by beef exports,
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: and that beef has been used in hamburger patties and
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: what seems to be really well received as the grass
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: fed New Zealand beef. And I think they mix it
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: with grain feed USA beef, so they get the fat
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: from the US beef and the nice lean beef from
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: New Zealand.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: That is very good. I love a good New Zealand beef. Now,
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: is this rise in US exports balancing out the lack
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: of demand in China as their economy stagmtes a little bit?
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Look at it's definitely helping China's you know, hugely important
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: to New Zealand. But what is remarkable about the US
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: skiing into the number two spot for our exports is
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: we don't actually have a free trade agreement with the
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: United States. So it just goes to show that it's
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: actually a very open market and while there are some tariffs,
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: you know, they're not high enough to be you know,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: preventing that trade happening. I think the key WE dollar
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: is probably helping as well, and that it's quite low
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: versus the US dollars, so that's going to make our
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: beef you know, quite affordable.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: But if we're hoping for a free traded agreement, if
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: we're hoping for a better market to go to, the
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: chances of that happening are very low under the current
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: administration in the United States of America. So what challenges
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: will that provide?
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. So the big challenge in worry that
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: I think a lot of countries have and everybody's watching
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: it closely, is what the United States will do with
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: regard to tariff So we're definitely keeping an eye on that.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: If the United States puts on blanket tariffs for all imports,
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: then that wouldn't be so bad for US because we'd
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: still be competitive. I mean, it means everybody's being taxed
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: at the same rate essentially, so yet that cost would
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: then fall on the USA consumer. But we would still
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: be competitive, so we just have to watch and wait
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: and see. Our trade balance with the United States is
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: quite even, so you know, we important export about the same.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: You know, it's not hugely different in terms of value.
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: So I can't really see New Zealand being picked out.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: So let's just let's just keep our fingers crossed.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: Execurators, when you have an excess and when you have
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: an imbalance, that's when you get picked upon. And Katherinbird,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: congratulations and I thank you for your time today, the
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: advocacy director for Export New Zealand.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
• 2:58
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• 3:01
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