Latest / Best of Business / Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on New Zealand and Australia meeting with South East Asian nations to boost business and security

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Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on New Zealand and Australia meeting with South East Asian nations to boost business and security · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks'd be follow
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  Speaker 2: Now, there's a big event going on in Malaysia bringing
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  Speaker 2: the three regions of New Zealand, Australia and Southeast Asia
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  Speaker 2: together and informtric's principal economist, Brad also never want to
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  Speaker 2: miss a party. Is at this party? Brad. Hello, good afternoon.
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  Speaker 2: So you guys are all there to kind of nut
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  Speaker 2: out how we all make money off each other.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, oh, I mean I don't think that's the official word,
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  Speaker 3: but that is definitely part of it. I mean, you
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  Speaker 3: look at Asian and the sort of wider Southeast Asian region.
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  Speaker 3: It's important to New Zealand, it's important to Australia, and
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  Speaker 3: so I'm part here as part of a delegation with
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  Speaker 3: the Asia New Zealand Foundation to have some of those conversations. Normally,
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  Speaker 3: right for these international things, you get the diplomats in
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  Speaker 3: the room, you get the Prime Minister in that in
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  Speaker 3: the room. Those are good conversations, but sometimes you want
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  Speaker 3: to take it down a level. You want to get
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  Speaker 3: the business people, the academics, the policy researchers to actually
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  Speaker 3: sort of talk a little bit more, you know, unhinged
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  Speaker 3: almost about things. But I mean you look at the
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  Speaker 3: numbers and you sort of see why this sort of
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  Speaker 3: conversation is important for New Zealand. Over the last twelve months,
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  Speaker 3: twenty six billion dollars worth of two way trade between
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  Speaker 3: Zion and New Zealand. If it was a country, it'd
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  Speaker 3: be our fourth largest trading partner. So all of that
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  Speaker 3: is critically important, and especially at a time when we're
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  Speaker 3: trying to grow our exports. We're trying to think about
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  Speaker 3: who and how we trade with and diversify our options.
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  Speaker 3: So it's a good conversation we're part of.
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  Speaker 2: So what business opportunities have we got in these regions
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  Speaker 2: that we are not already tapped into.
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  Speaker 3: I mean there's quite a few. There's obviously trying to
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  Speaker 3: continue to upgrade what we've already got. You know, if
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  Speaker 3: we look at what we trade often into Southeast Asia,
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  Speaker 3: it is the traditional exports for New Zealand, the likes
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  Speaker 3: of you know, dairy tourism, fruits and meats and the like,
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  Speaker 3: but also importantly making sure we've got the ability to
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  Speaker 3: get the stuff we need in from the region. So
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  Speaker 3: the likes of a lot of our oil, a lot
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  Speaker 3: of our vehicles, a lot of our manufacturing comes from
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  Speaker 3: Southeast Asia into New Zealand. And that's also coming at
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  Speaker 3: a time when, of course you look at sort of
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  Speaker 3: the security issues around the world, there's a lot of
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  Speaker 3: geopolitical positioning, there's concerns around you know, the US elections
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  Speaker 3: coming up, about a week of Chinese economy, and increasingly
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  Speaker 3: we're seeing more and more businesses across the world looking
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  Speaker 3: to Southeast Asia in terms of manufacturing so they're not
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  Speaker 3: caught up in too much of these geopolitical issues. That
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  Speaker 3: means that if New Zealand wants to still maintain good
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  Speaker 3: supply chains and good ability to move stuff in and
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  Speaker 3: out of New Zealand and trade with the world, we've
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  Speaker 3: sort of got to be here. So I think a
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  Speaker 3: lot of it is about shoring up what we've currently
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  Speaker 3: got and ensuring that we're sort of part of the
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  Speaker 3: conversation rather than being bypassed.
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  Speaker 2: Are we all heavily heavily, heavily heavily reliant on China
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  Speaker 2: managing to make this thing work?
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  Speaker 3: In a sense? I think actually what's come out in
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  Speaker 3: the conversation so far today has been a little bit
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  Speaker 3: of a focus on well, how do we do it
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  Speaker 3: ourselves a little bit more? And that's not deliberately moving
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  Speaker 3: away far from China or towards any other area. It's
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  Speaker 3: more saying well, instead of sort of trying to second
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  Speaker 3: guess how every other country in the world might do
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  Speaker 3: their own thing, and the worries around all that risk,
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  Speaker 3: like you say, of having eggs all in the one basket,
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  Speaker 3: how can New Zealand how can some of the other
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  Speaker 3: partners that we work with, like Arzion next year it's
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  Speaker 3: fifty years of you know, engagement and diplomacy with the region.
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  Speaker 3: That sort of says that actually, we can work on
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  Speaker 3: some quite cool stuff together. We can think about particularly
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  Speaker 3: New Zealand's got some good stuff in the green energy
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  Speaker 3: space that Southeast Asia is looking at. So I think
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  Speaker 3: there's a lot where we're offering up our expertise. We
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  Speaker 3: obviously have a lot of people that come, a lot
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  Speaker 3: of travelers from New Zealand to head out to the
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  Speaker 3: region as well, and then it's that sort of the
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  Speaker 3: goods and the services trade. So I think there are
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  Speaker 3: some big opportunities. I mean, you look at the numbers
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  Speaker 3: and I think this is the surprising challenge. New Zealand
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  Speaker 3: often doesn't think as much about sort of let's call
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  Speaker 3: it countries five through twenty in terms of our top
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  Speaker 3: ten are or our top twenty trade off we think
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  Speaker 3: of the few big ones at the top. It's actually
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  Speaker 3: still a lot of those slightly smaller but still pretty
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  Speaker 3: big trade opportunities that we could grow to a whole
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  Speaker 3: new level.
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  Speaker 2: Brilliant stuff. Brad, enjoy yourself, really appreciate it. Thanks for
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  Speaker 2: talking to us from Malayia. That's Brad Awso in for
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  Speaker 2: Metrix Principal Economists.
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