Brexit fret for Kiwi exporters
New Zealand Trade & Enterprise will hold seminars this week for Kiwi businesses concerned about Brexit, but ExportNZ executive director Catherine Beard says exporters who haven’t already planned ahead may have left it late.
Kiwi exporters are on the frontline of Brexit planning because of New Zealand’s distance from the UK.
Although Britain won’t leave the European Union before March 29, companies around the world are having to second-guess how supplies that they ship to the UK ahead of that date could be treated if they arrived after a ‘‘no deal’’.
Beard said she had heard reports of exporters resorting to building up stores of products in homes and garages in the UK as Britain’s warehouses fill up with stockpiled goods.
She speculated it was possible Britain would have no choice but to open its borders in the event it crashed out of the EU without a deal, because of the logistical issues it would otherwise face.
She believed many Kiwi exporters had been planning ahead by building up stock in the UK over the past few months.
‘‘There has definitely been forward-planning going on and, if you left it to the next four weeks, you might find you are struggling to find spaces to store goods.’’
One positive was that Kiwi exporters of perishable agricultural commodities had quite a lot of experience of re-routing produce in transit to take advantage of changes in commodity prices, she said.
NZTE’s seminars will be held in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch between tomorrow and Thursday, and online.
Representatives from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Ministry for Primary Industries, and the Customs Service will provide updates on developments in the UK and on how firms can prepare for Brexit.