F.O.L. lifts ban on Chile trade

Press, 7 August 1982, Page 1

F.O.L. lifts ban on Chile trade

PA Wellington

The Federation of Labour’s decision to lift the embargo on trade with Chile from September 30 was welcomed today by community groups involved in international trade.

The president of the Chambers of Commerce, Mr Allan Williams, said there would be a great sense of relief that the era of the ban was over. .

“The ban has been a'great source of frustration, hurting New Zealand more than Chile,” he said. Renewed access to the Chilean market and the rest of South America was a big step forward for New Zealand’s seed producers, said Mr Ness Wright, chairman of the Dominion agriculture section of Federated Farmers. Millions of dollars of trade had been lost through the

short-sighted attitude of the F.0.L.. said Mr Wright. Sales of New Zealand herbage and clover seed were particularly affected, as the ban coincided with the gradual fall-off in the other markets for these commodities. The decision to lift the ban. imposed after the overthrow in 1972 of President Salvador Allende during a military coup in Santiago, was announced by the president of the F.0.L., Mr W. J. Knox, at a press conference yesterday..

The Minister of Labour (Mr Bolger) also welcomed the decision to lift the ban that had been “a futile exercise that hurt New Zealand far more than it hurt Chile.” “It cost New Zealand tens of millions of dollars in export earnings and had cost countless job opportunities for New Zealanders within New Zealand," he said.

“It is regrettable that the decision to lift the ban has taken so long, but it is a welcome recognition by the F.O.L. that this self-imposed ban on exports had to stop.” The Minister of Foreign Affairs and Overseas Trade (Mr Cooper) said the Government was “pleased" the F.O.L. had lifted the ban. He said the Government would have liked to see the ban removed immediately rather than from September 30, but the F.O.L. decision meant that businessmen could now “go about their business and do some selling.”

Mr Cooper said he hoped the Chilean market could be worth $lOO million “within a few years.”

It is now worth about $l6 million in spite of the ban, but he said that other foreign traders were already entrenched in the market"