‘Open door to Asian goods’

Press, 1 May 1980, Page 28

‘Open door to Asian goods’

PA Auckland New Zealand has been told to open its doors to 'Asian exports and reduce "the present record inflation rate. The. call came from the ' High Commissioner for ■ Singapore (Mr H. E. Chan) in an address to a Pacific Basin Economic Council seminar at Auckland.

1 The Pacific Basin now accounts for two-thirds of all New. Zealand external ■ < trade, but Mr Chan chal- • lenged New Zealand to be ; imore imaginative and in--1 novative in its dealings, ;and less defensive regarding imports from those i -countries. i . “Economics is not a ■' zero'sum game, and there

is indeed a new and brighter plateau of wealth for all, but it will take vision and the combined effort of all to reach it,” he said.

“I would even suggeste that one of the best ways of lowering your inflation fever is to import freely big supplies of consumer and other goods from these countries,” he said. New Zealand’s East Asian trade has doubled during the last decade, and it will double again in the 1980 s, according to the deputy head of the Prime Minister’s Department, Mr G. C. Hensley. Mr Hensley, a former New Zealand High Commissioner in Singapore, forecast more friction be-

tween Pacific nations as trade grows. Arguments between the United States and Japan about imports was ‘an example of the type of squabbles which would develop as" Asian nations pressed for market access in countries such as Australia and New Zealand, he said.

“The idea of a Pacific Community is now on the agenda, and may begin to take shape during the decade,”- Mr Hensley said.

Such a community approach could provide a useful buffer against the trade arguments and conflicts which were likely to develop as trade expanded.There are no restrictions or special favours for New

Zealand exports to Hong Kong, according to the director of the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce. (Mr J. D. McGregor). “If there is a demand for a product, or a demand can be created, it will sell in Hong Kong” he said. He told exporters that they should not be disheartened by the thought that New Zealand was a high-wage country, Sevh i g h-wage countries, such as Switzerland, West Germany, Sweden, the United States, and Australia had developed high-technology exports to Hong Kong. Mr McGregor said that Hong Kong was the freest market in the world.