Articles

US President Donald Trump has imposed a series of tariffs upon major US trading partners to encourage more American manufacturing, as well as to pressure its neighbours to shore up border security to prevent illegal immigrants and fentanyl entering the US.

Rapidly declining export prices have ramped up the pressure on New Zealand exporters and pushed our terms of trade to a seven-year low. Export prices were down by 13%pa in the December 2023 quarter, the largest annual decline since 2009. In comparison, import prices fell a much smaller 2.2%pa.

This article outlines how the Israel-Gaza conflict is impacting freight prices, and the implications for New Zealand. Freight prices had been steadily declining since mid-2021 as pandemic-related supply-chain issues dissipated, but picked up sharply in January.

A constrained global supply of diesel has led to a substantial increase in prices over the last few months, both for importers, and at the pump. Higher diesel costs threaten to intensify inflationary pressures, with geopolitical concerns adding further upside risk. In this article, we outline the issues facing the current diesel market, and the outlook over the remainder of 2023 and into 2024.

Three years after COVID-19 emerged, New Zealand is grappling with economic imbalances that have been amplified by the pandemic, our response, and its aftermath. The gap between our exports and imports has not been worse in almost 50 years, the only way to grow the economy seems to be by opening the migration tap, and housing affordability remains as critical as ever. We must strive for better, more sustainable, ways to increase productivity and grow the economy – and soon.

Since New Zealand’s free-trade agreement with China came into force in late 2008, the share of our exports heading to China has lifted from 5% to as high as 32% last year. This well-documented trend clearly reflects the economic benefits to New Zealand of being hooked into the fast-growing Chinese market. But the increasing concentration on a single market has also raised questions of New Zealand’s overreliance

The global economic outlook soured in early 2022, with the recovery being stifled by high inflation, continued supply chain disruptions, and rising geopolitical clashes. There’s a lot happening, and although this article doesn’t capture every piece of global economic news, it does set out some of the key global hurdles, and what they mean for the economic outlook.

The global security picture has been upended after the Russian invasion of Ukraine last week, with heavy fighting across all invasion fronts, substantial sanctions on Russia by Western countries, and Russian President Vladimir Putin ordering the country’s nuclear deterrence forces “to a special mode of combat duty.” Global tensions are ratcheting higher, with increased uncertainty about the global economic outlook. Prices for energy products, farm inputs, and metals have risen, and financial markets are volatile as the Russian financial system feels the pressures of isolation.

China has become a posterchild for developing nations and having lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, you can see why. Despite its authoritarian-style rule and being a greater champion of the state than the individual, China’s economy has done extremely well after adopting a more open economy and market-driven principals in the late 1970s. How long can this dream run for China’s “socialist market economy” go on for?

The free trade agreement signed earlier this month between New Zealand and the United Kingdom will open up huge opportunities for local exporters. The Free Trade Agreement (FTA) will eliminate all tariffs on New Zealand exports, with 97% of them being removed the day the FTA comes into force. Although, the government estimates the FTA will boost GDP by $1b we have used our Export Market Finder tool to identify some of the top opportunities for New Zealand exporters.