Border plan tops Exportnz’s wish list
A plan for safely opening New Zealand’s border to international students, business travellers and ‘‘essential skilled workers’’ should be the next government’s top priority, lobby group Exportnz says.
Executive director Catherine Beard praised the Government’s health response to the Covid-19 pandemic but said the policies of the National Party and ACT Party were closest to its ‘‘manifesto’’.
Labour and National leaders Jacinda Ardern and Judith Collins were upbeat about the prospects for a vaccine during the Newshub’s leaders’ debate on Wednesday. But Beard said Exportnz believed New Zealand would need to live with the virus ‘‘in such a way that businesses can continue to operate, trade and travel safely’’.
‘‘Obviously the whole world has a huge vested interest in finding a vaccine, but some of us are concerned these things take time,’’ she said.
The concern of the export sector was that the country couldn’t stay isolated from the world for too long, ‘‘because it is going to have implications for the forward pipeline of business’’.
‘‘Speed of contact tracing is . . . superimportant.’’ Catherine Beard
Exportnz
Exportnz said it wanted to see ‘‘a sophisticated and ‘high-tech’ border, for timely access to importing critical skilled talent, for business travel and for foreign students’’.
That might involve the deployment of Bluetooth Covid card devices to improve contact tracing, Beard said.
‘‘It sounds quite sensible to us. If we are going to continue to operate and not have shutdowns that are hugely damaging, then that speed of contact tracing is absolutely superimportant.’’
A combination of National and ACT’S policies was probably closest to those in ExportNZ’S manifesto, she said. ‘‘The current Government has done a fantastic job containing Covid. It has been a very healthdriven response, and that has been good for New Zealand in that we are more open now compared to other countries.’’
It had also been good for the ‘‘New Zealand brand’’, she said. ‘‘But I think economic recovery is a whole new ball game, and business needs to be closer at the table.’’