Quality trade deals matter

ExportNZ says Foreign Affairs Minister Mahuta’s speech to the NZ China Council on NZ and China shows we can run an independent foreign policy while being consistent towards China, and without using a security alliance like Five Eyes for a broader remit than intended.  “Exporters want diversified markets but China is a key partner that we have a high quality free trade deal with.  Let’s see if we can get the same quality deal with those countries that are traditional allies, many of which still apply stiff tariffs and barriers to NZ exports,” ExportNZ’s Catherine Beard said.

How big we want to be

EMA says NZ needs a population strategy.  “As the Government develops new immigration policy and starts to reopen borders, it should go further and start making policy about population numbers,”  EMA CEO Brett O’Riley said.  “Workforce shortages are helped short-term by immigration, but in the longer-term we need to consider what would be an optimal size of the workforce and an optimal population size.  We need bi-partisan agreement on how big we want our country to be.” 

Helping NZ’s frontier firms

The Productivity Commission has recommended ways the Govt can better support NZ’s leading export firms: enabling greater foreign investment, improving regulations, supporting health tech and areas of already occurring competitive advantage, and ensuring firms have access to skilled workers. ExportNZ said the recommendations are in line with exporters’ views on issues including having access to a strong pipeline of international skills as well as locally educated talent.

Make Apprenticeship Boost permanent

BusinessNZ is calling for the Apprenticeship Boost scheme to be a permanent fixture.  Last year the scheme boosted apprenticeships by 17%.  CEO Kirk Hope said supporting businesses to train on the job is an effective and efficient way of developing the skills pipeline, particularly in areas like construction which has had skill shortages for many years.  “In 2010, there were over 300,000 enrolments in vocational education which declined to around 226,000 in 2019 - Apprenticeship Boost is now helping to arrest this decline.”

Low-carbon freight pathway

The Sustainable Business Council’s Freight Group has released its plan to help decarbonise NZ’s freight system.  It's focused on road transport and proposes reducing emissions by optimising the use of existing vehicles; then replacing fossil fuels with biofuels; then as vehicles are retired, eliminating them by replacing them with zero-carbon vehicles.  The Freight Group includes Countdown, Fonterra, Lyttelton Port Company, NZ Post, Ports of Auckland, Swire Shipping, The Warehouse Group, TIL Logistics Group and Toll.

Land use threat

The Environment Ministry and Stats NZ have done a stocktake of land use in NZ and warn that productive agricultural land is being dissipated through urban sprawl, lifestyle blocks and rural subdivision.  Urban expansion has increased around 15% in the last 25 years, with most around Auckland, Christchurch and Waikato.  Continued land fragmentation will limit future options for the use of the land, the report says, posing a choice between continued sprawl or more dense development in urban areas.   

Whistle-blower protection

Improvements to NZ’s whistle-blower legislation are underway.  The Protected Disclosures (Protection of Whistleblowers) Bill is aimed at ensuring private sector workers have the same protections as public sector workers against victimisation or threatened victimisation as a result of disclosing workplace wrongdoing.  An employee whistleblowing on illegal, oppressive, unlawfully discriminatory or grossly negligent behaviour will have their privacy and job status protected under the new legislation which comes into force 1 July.

Firms want better govt procurement

Businesses that supply, or want to supply, goods and service to government agencies are invited to give feedback to MBIE’s annual survey of govt procurement.  MBIE’s survey comes as firms express concern at missing out on large government IT contracts, including NZ’s Covid vaccination IT systems recently going to overseas companies: IT advocate NZRise says Covid exemptions to procurement rules are keeping local firms out of the running.  The survey of government procurement closes on May 10.