Cast your minds back the ‘good old days,’ when New Zealand traded with Britain in a manner that had us almost hog-tied to the point that if Britain swerved in any way, we went along with ‘her.’ Our fortunes were strongly linked with those of Britain. Remember the phrase ; ‘Where Britain goes, we go,’ a position that took us to two World Wars,’ and one that the UK hardly takes into account in our modern day relationship. When the UK took itself into the ‘Common Market and closely aligned itself with Europe, the writing was on the wall and New Zealand rapidly realized that diversifying our trading partners was an essential fact of life in the new world. To a great extent we have succeeded in breaking that old economic partnership and the UK is now one of many trading partners. The relationship is relatively healthy and a two way one.
Other markets have also become important to us and we now trade with a huge number of countries. We produce a wider range of goods for the world, but it must be said that we are still a predominantly primary producer of goods, that thankfully represent choices that the world really needs, like ‘protein.’
With the growth and resurgence of the massive Chinese market, things have taken a different turn for New Zealand; almost one that resembles in some ways the old relationship we had with Britain, minus a few cultural factors and that of shared history. To some in New Zealand this new relationship is fraught with hooks; the main one being perceptions of human rights abuse from the top heavy Chinese Communist Party. New Zealand has for many years put its hand up, albeit a small one, for the rights of individuals and groups to have access to freedom of expression. That is something that is held very highly here, but one that is difficult to export to other societies, where other forces are more values; namely that of the access to food, housing and employment. If the later are delivered, then such lofty ideals that we often espouse, are seen as secondary to the reality of ‘survival.
