Heads up – Embassy 9 – June 2008

New Zealand – Trade secrets

There’s much more to diplomacy than endless rounds of cocktail parties – it’s about bread and butter issues too.

That’s literally the case for Derek Leask, New Zealand’s newly-arrived High Commissioner to London, who helped save New Zealand’s butter exports from the vagaries of the EU’s quota system.

“There were a billion New Zealand dollars at stake so we had to spend a bit of time to fix it,” says Leask, who spent four years as Ambassador to the European Communities (1994-99) much of it working on this issue “and enjoyed every minute of it”.

Leask returned to New Zealand’s Foreign affairs and Trade Ministry where for four years (2005-2008) he was Deputy Secretary responsible for New Zealand’s global trade negotiations efforts – in the WTO and in bilateral agreements like New Zealand’s recent Free Trade Agreement with China.

Here in the United Kingdom, the High Commissioner will maintain his attention to the Doha Round of trade talks – New Zealand will be working closely with his UK and EU partners to achieve a successful conclusion to the round.

With the Common Agricultural Policy up for review during the French Presidency, Leask will be keeping a keen eye on the machinations in Brussels.

“We will be following this very closely for any developments which might have an impact on the position of the Doha Round,” he says, adding: “But the negotiations have been moving steadily in the agricultural area and we trust that the EU will continue to negotiate and continue to see that Europe has as much to gain as anybody from a world trading environment that is working effectively and liberally.”

The ongoing debate about food miles has the potential to affect New Zealand exports, but trade experts in New Zealand had spotted the issue long before it hit the headlines and were ready with research and counter-argument.

“Food miles was a remarkably badly thought through concept because the miles that the food travels is only one aspect of the total carbon footprint, and the carbon footprint is just one aspect of its broader environmental impact,” explains Leask.

“It was quickly demonstrated that many products produced in New Zealand and exported by ship to the UK had a significantly lower carbon footprint than other produce being sold in the UK. We were able to put out the material which showed that the arguments being given were nonsense.”

The example is testament to how seriously New Zealand takes its trade diplomacy. “Small countries like New Zealand find it increasingly difficult to operate in a globalised world where size really matters. You can get through that but you have to have very efficient, very savvy economic operators.”

One of Leask’s priorities, therefore, will be to support agencies such as Investment New Zealand and New Zealand Trade and Enterprise so that New Zealand keeps its competitive edge.

In addition to cooperation with Britain on the traditional range of policy issues – from climate change to security policy – Leask wants do ensure that the vibrant historical, family, cultural, academic, and sporting links with the UK are maintained.

There are up to 200,000 Kiwis visiting, living and working in the UK and, in addition to providing them with consular services, the High Commissioner will be monitoring developments in Britain’s immigration policy that might affect these valuable people-to-people contacts.

This will be the High Commissioner’s second tour of duty it the capital. The first was in the 1980s, when, as a counsellor, he dealt with political, defence and security issues. At that time the New Zealand mission in London dealt extensively with the British and Irish governments over Northern Ireland. Leask regularly represented New Zealand on the International Fund for Ireland which then, as now, aims to promote contact dialogue and reconciliation between nationalists and unionists throughout Ireland. Leask is enormously impressed that the situation has improved so dramatically since he last served in London.