INZBC members bat for high-quality FTA
Arvind Mehta, India’s lead negotiator of the FTA, was in Auckland for nearly a week. He participated in three different sessions organised by the India New Zealand Business Council (INZBC). The session on June 15 at EY, Auckland, was a standout session as rapid fire sectoral presentations were made with the clear brief as to what those sectors expect out of this proposed FTA. Each sector was given three to five minutes to pitch their ideas and expectations, which made Mr Mehta comment that he had never encountered such a concise yet focussed FTA interaction.
The sectoral presentations were given by Aaron Quintal, Partner and Leader, Telecommunications, EY NZ who focussed on the media and technology sector. Hamish Smith, Sales Manager, Glidepath Group, spoke on logistics management and Steve Goodfellow, Business Development Manager, Beijer Ref Australia covered cold chain management. Rachel Simpson, International Market Manager—Middle-East, Africa, South Asia, Education New Zealand presented on the education sector with Earl Rattray, Chairman, Binsar Farms Pvt (India), who covered the much talked about dairy sector. Kuldip Arora spoke about the services sector and the hospitality area and the issues this industry faces due to specialist skill shortage, which needs to be covered in the proposed FTA when compared to the 1,800 visas, which are part of the China FTA. Alan Pollard extolled the benefits New Zealand can provide to apple industry in the home state of Mr Mehta and Kevin D’Souza of India charted out a course, which would increase the trade between round wood. The theme across all the sectoral presentations was consistently in favour of a tariff-free trading environment, which will create win-win situations for both countries.
At the meet, Mr Mehta took on board all the comments and said, “There is a unique combination between India’s scale and New Zealand’s experimentation that brings its own set of best practices into intermingling of two wonderful cultures to then create so much more that can be done [with] the opportunities that India presents in any sector be it dairy, agriculture, horticulture, and many more. There are limitless potentialities of collaboration possible through the vibrant relationship between two countries."
He particularly touched on the points covered by Kuldip Arora and assured him that he will look into his requests but appealed to the industry and the business leaders, in general, to have a moderate expectation of the FTA, as it is just a starting point.
Mr Mehta also emphasised that among some of the RCEF countries who are also a part of TPP, there is a pattern, as they wish to bring the same TPP architecture into the RCEF mechanism. To this, he said, “I would also like to articulate very openly that if India desires a TPP architecture, India would have joined the TPP talks much earlier. So obviously there is some political mechanism of a democracy that limits India from viewing TPP as the gold standard in the current context.
“I believe what needs to be understood by some of the negotiators from the opposite side of the table is that despite the tariffs, India is a very open economy, its straight intensity of goods and the services and presentable GDP is one of the highest in the world, far higher than USA and China.”
Despite the pitch by Mr Mehta to support moderate tariff as compared to zero tariffs, the mood in the room was upbeat and the industry decided to continue its effort to work towards a zero tariff trading environment as New Zealand will never be able to produce any product in a volume high enough to affect the Indian industry be it the manufacturing sector, dairy or agriculture.
Arvind Mehta, India’s lead negotiator of the FTA, was in Auckland for nearly a week. He participated in three different sessions organised by the India New Zealand Business Council (INZBC). The session on June 15 at EY, Auckland, was a standout session as rapid fire sectoral presentations were made...
Arvind Mehta, India’s lead negotiator of the FTA, was in Auckland for nearly a week. He participated in three different sessions organised by the India New Zealand Business Council (INZBC). The session on June 15 at EY, Auckland, was a standout session as rapid fire sectoral presentations were made with the clear brief as to what those sectors expect out of this proposed FTA. Each sector was given three to five minutes to pitch their ideas and expectations, which made Mr Mehta comment that he had never encountered such a concise yet focussed FTA interaction.
The sectoral presentations were given by Aaron Quintal, Partner and Leader, Telecommunications, EY NZ who focussed on the media and technology sector. Hamish Smith, Sales Manager, Glidepath Group, spoke on logistics management and Steve Goodfellow, Business Development Manager, Beijer Ref Australia covered cold chain management. Rachel Simpson, International Market Manager—Middle-East, Africa, South Asia, Education New Zealand presented on the education sector with Earl Rattray, Chairman, Binsar Farms Pvt (India), who covered the much talked about dairy sector. Kuldip Arora spoke about the services sector and the hospitality area and the issues this industry faces due to specialist skill shortage, which needs to be covered in the proposed FTA when compared to the 1,800 visas, which are part of the China FTA. Alan Pollard extolled the benefits New Zealand can provide to apple industry in the home state of Mr Mehta and Kevin D’Souza of India charted out a course, which would increase the trade between round wood. The theme across all the sectoral presentations was consistently in favour of a tariff-free trading environment, which will create win-win situations for both countries.
At the meet, Mr Mehta took on board all the comments and said, “There is a unique combination between India’s scale and New Zealand’s experimentation that brings its own set of best practices into intermingling of two wonderful cultures to then create so much more that can be done [with] the opportunities that India presents in any sector be it dairy, agriculture, horticulture, and many more. There are limitless potentialities of collaboration possible through the vibrant relationship between two countries."
He particularly touched on the points covered by Kuldip Arora and assured him that he will look into his requests but appealed to the industry and the business leaders, in general, to have a moderate expectation of the FTA, as it is just a starting point.
Mr Mehta also emphasised that among some of the RCEF countries who are also a part of TPP, there is a pattern, as they wish to bring the same TPP architecture into the RCEF mechanism. To this, he said, “I would also like to articulate very openly that if India desires a TPP architecture, India would have joined the TPP talks much earlier. So obviously there is some political mechanism of a democracy that limits India from viewing TPP as the gold standard in the current context.
“I believe what needs to be understood by some of the negotiators from the opposite side of the table is that despite the tariffs, India is a very open economy, its straight intensity of goods and the services and presentable GDP is one of the highest in the world, far higher than USA and China.”
Despite the pitch by Mr Mehta to support moderate tariff as compared to zero tariffs, the mood in the room was upbeat and the industry decided to continue its effort to work towards a zero tariff trading environment as New Zealand will never be able to produce any product in a volume high enough to affect the Indian industry be it the manufacturing sector, dairy or agriculture.
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