Certificates For Hong Kong Imports

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29913, 29 August 1962, Page 19

Certificates For Hong Kong Imports

A Hong Kong mail order firm that has built up substantial business in cheap clothing and other articles to customers in New Zealand is "not interested” in seeking Commonwealth preference certificates covering their exports so that New Zealanders can benefit from lighter duties. This information was given in a letter from the New Zealand Government Trade Commissioner in Hong Kong (Mr J. P. Costello) in reply to an inquiry from "The Press.”

Goods made in Hong Kong which are at least 50 per cent Commonwealth content are admitted into New Zealand under the British preferential tariff as long as they are accompanied by a Commonwealth Preference Certificate—known as a C.P.C.— according to Mr Costello. “C.P.C.'s are issued by accountants in Hong Kong approved by the Hong Kong Government,” he says. Firms requiring these certificates must install separate accounting and record systems for the part of the production for export to New Zealand. Britain and those other Commonwealth countries requiring the certificates for preferential rates of duly Installing and operating these systems is expensive and unless a firm sends a large part of its output to countries such as New Zealand it is reluctant to comply with CP.C. requirements, says Mr Costello. Most mail orders from Hong Kong to New Zealand come from a firm if retailers of embroidered table cloths, car coats and other clothing items. The table cloths mostly come from China, while the car coats are manufactured locally in Hong Kong, but the firm does not know if they are 50 per cent, or more Commonwealth content. Exports are by mail order only and the firm doesn't give certificates of origins.

Another firm that does some mail order business with New Zealand in footwear gets its materials from various countries, among • them Australia and West J Germar y, and cannot comply with certificate requirements. “Neither of these firms is interested in setting up accounting systems to qualify them for preference certifi- ; cates as their export busi- • ncss is small,” Mr Costcdllo adds.