NZ-US free trade deal not on agenda
Business Week
NZ-US free trade deal not on agenda
23 August 2005
Associated Press, Wellington
AUG. 23 3:20 A.M. ET U.S. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said on Tuesday that a free trade agreement with New Zealand was not on the Bush administration’s agenda, but remains a possibility in the future.
"It’s a situation where there aren’t current plans but we are open to the possibility, open to the discussion," Johanns told reporters after meeting Prime Minister Helen Clark in the northern city of Auckland.
While refusing to rule out a bilateral free trade pact, he emphasized the good relationship between the two nations, who fell out in 1985 over New Zealand’s anti-nuclear policies and law.
"Our relationship with New Zealand has always been good, it really has. We’re good trading partners, we’re the second largest customer for New Zealand products, our governments work together very well," Johanns said.
Two-way trade between the two nations tallied 8.3 billion New Zealand dollars (US$5.8 billion; euro4.7 billion) in the year ended March 31, 2005.
Clark said both countries were concerned about the latest World Trade Organization trade round coming up later in the year.
"New Zealand never misses an opportunity to talk about (a bilateral trade deal) and I think its good that the secretary will go away hearing first hand from us on our home ground about it," she said.
U.S. administration officials have indicated earlier that the "unfinished business" of the anti-nuclear law barring nuclear weapons and nuclear-propelled ships from New Zealand ports remains the major stumbling block to a bilateral free trade pact.
Washington recently inked a free trade deal with New Zealand’s neighbor and close trading partner Australia.
