THE PRESS MONDAY, JULY 14, 1980. Trade ban which hurts N.Z.

Press, 14 July 1980, Page 16

THE PRESS MONDAY, JULY 14, 1980. Trade ban which hurts N.Z.

A delegation of New Zealand businessmen is setting out for Chile carrying with it the uncomfortable and unfair burden of the Federation of Labour's continuing ban on trade with Chile. The situation would be ludicrous were it not so damaging to New Zealand’s interests, and to the interests of many New Zealanders in whose name the F.O.L. claims to speak.

In the scale of international events the military coup in Chile seven years ago is becoming ancient history. At the time it was a violent and unpleasant affair. The regime it set up was unpleasant, though not notably cruel by the standards of Latin America, or of much of the rest of the world. The regime which the military displaced was probably, at least as violent, and was certainly much less efficient, than Chile’s military rulers. Recent visitors to Chile report that the country is booming. Inflation of 600 per cent under the old regime of President Allende has been reduced to about 13 per cent, a figure which New Zealand might envy. Chileans are wealthy enough again to make their country an attractive market for others. Goods are flowing in from many parts of the world, not least from such Communist States as China, Poland, Cuba, and Czechoslovakia. East Germany maintains a trade mission in Santiago. Yet these countries were to the fore in urging the trade boycott to which New Zealand, alone in the world, continues to pay anything more than lip service.

However well intentioned the boycott might once have been, the point is surely lost when the ban on trade damages New Zealand while it passes almost without notice in Chile. New Zealand exports worth several million dollars continue to reach Chile each year, but the trade requires expensive trans-shipping. Trade in dairy products, livestock, seeds and a variety of farm and forestry machinery could be expanded greatly if exporters were not forced by the F.O.L. and some of its constituent unions, to find clandestine ways of getting goods to Chile. The Deputy Minister of Finance (Mr Templeton) said at the week-end that the trade ban was costing New Zealand many millions of dollars. This might be acceptable if the ban was known to be influencing the behaviour of a particularly cruel government, or if such bans were being applied consistently to any State round the world of whose government some New Zea-

landers disapproved. Such a policy, however, would probably reduce New Zealand to trading with no more than a handful of other countries.

In any catalogue of countries which have governments imposed by force rather than by democratic election, and that would include more than half the members of the United Nations. Chile would not rank as especially obnoxious. According to a recent extensive report in the London “Economist.” 54 political prisoners remain in Chilean jails, a slim catch indeed when compared with such States as Iran, Vietnam, or South Africa.

The F.O.L. leaders have persuaded themselves into an awkward situation. Chile has been a fashionable cause, •although never one to bring out more than a small group of ill-informed demonstrators in New Zealand. The steady improvement of life in Chile is ignored or simply not noticed by those who have been equally ready to ignore the ruin which the Allende Government, before its overthrow, had brought to Chile.

To expect the leaders of the F.O.L. to admit they have been wrong in maintaining a ban which the rest of the world ignores would be too optimistic. But if the trade delegation can come back from Chile and demonstrate publicly that New Zealand is missing valuable trading opportunities to the detriment of the members of the very unions whose leaders maintain the ban, some of the F.O.L. leaders at least might have the sense to re-examine their position.

No attempt has ever been made to establish the opinion of New Zealanders about the ban. It was imposed in an authoritarian manner which resembles the behaviour of the Government it is directed against. New Zealand's prosperity depends on this country’s ability to find new markets. An ineffective trade ban, whatever its moral justification, is a luxury which cannot be afforded.

The point has been tacitly accepted in trading relations with the Soviet. Union and Iran, to recall only the most flagrant offenders against civilized behaviour in recent months. No doubt the ban against Chile gives a handful of New Zealanders a warm glow of selfrighteousness. That is hardly adequate justification for allowing one segment of the community to usurp the place of lhe elected Government in determining questions of trade and foreign policy.