‘Nothing to fear’ over China

The prime minister has moved to allay fears over a perceived rift with China, as speculation mounts that New Zealand has fallen out of favour with the economic super power.

The Government, foreign affairs officials and business commentators alike have called for calm, as fears mount New Zealand’s economy could suffer if our second largest trading partner was to turn off the tap.

But Jacinda Ardern said there was no indication that had happened, and claims otherwise did ‘‘not reflect facts’’. New Zealand’s primary exports ‘‘continue to clear the border as usual’’.

‘‘China is a very important and highly valued partner for New Zealand. I know from my discussion with Premier Li [Keqiang] in November, that China also values its relationship

with New Zealand,’’ Ardern said.

‘‘Our officials in China have confirmed that New Zealand primary product continues to clear the border as usual. There is no indication of anything out of the ordinary in China’s border clearance procedures for New Zealand products.’’

She acknowledged there would sometimes be ‘‘temporary technical issues’’ but they needed to be kept in context. Ardern released figures showing exports were up 20 per cent last year, while the rate of consignments stopped at the border totalled 0.26 per cent of all exports.

‘‘In January 2019, it was

0.29 per cent – a change of only

0.03 per cent is not statistically significant. This should also be considered alongside significant changes to border processing China has made over the past year,’’ Ardern said. Those changes were due to a massive merger of two border control agencies – the Chinese equivalents of New Zealand’s Customs Agency and the Ministry of Primary Industries – totalling more than 100,000 personnel.

The China free trade agreement – currently $27 billion in two-way trade – was partway through upgrade negotiations.

But a number of non-trade related incidents still pointed to a deterioration in the diplomatic relationship over the past 18 months. They included the blocking of Chinese telco Huawei to build a 5G network for Spark, and a number of delays and ‘‘scheduling issues’’, which have prevented Ardern visiting China, delayed the launch of the Chinese NZ Year of Tourism, and backed up a raft of ministers travelling to visit counterparts there.

An Air NZ passenger plane was recently forced to make a U-turn back to New Zealand, however the airline has accepted full responsibility citing an ‘‘administration error’’ in its paperwork, for the reason it was not given authority to land in Shanghai.

Ardern’s move to issue a statement comes as exporters had begun to be more vocal about delays at the Chinese border, with fisheries company Sanford the latest to claim it had been experiencing ‘‘administrative issues’’, which had led to delays in getting shipments cleared through Chinese ports.

Earlier in the week, however, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise chief executive Peter Chrisp told MPs at a select committee that while there had been much anecdotal claims of export difficulty, there had not been enough to substantiate a pattern or any system-wide issue.

Diplomatic sources have also said the incident rate of export shipments being delayed at the border in China last year was significantly fewer than in years prior.

Ardern echoed the sentiment, but she did acknowledge challenges in other areas. That Ardern had taken the step of issuing a statement to quell fears of trade reprisals, pointed to concern that an overly negative narrative could become self-fulfilling.

It’s understood relevant ministers’ offices have made ‘‘urgent’’ requests of departments to provide advice on Chinese participation numbers in a number of areas, like tertiary education.

The relationship was ‘‘robust and mature’’ to be able to handle differences in opinion in a professional way, Ardern said.

However, the relationship had undergone a shift and it was partially due to New Zealand strengthening its own stance against Chinese military expansion in the South Pacific Sea and further into the Pacific region.

‘‘New Zealand primary product continues to clear the border as usual.’’ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern