Chamber Welcomes New CER Rules Of Origin

3 February 2006

Chamber Welcomes New CER Rules Of Origin

The Wellington Regional Chamber of Commerce welcomes the progress that has been made to update the rules which determine country of origin under the CER Agreement between Australia and New Zealand.

“The previous rules, based on 50% regional value content were acting as a disincentive to efficiency gains being made by New Zealand companies” said Charles Finny Chamber CEO. “The new rules, based largely on change in tariff classification are a huge improvement. New Zealand businesses have been encouraging this change in rules for many years.

We know that successive New Zealand Governments have been seeking this change on behalf of New Zealand exporters for at least 10 years.

Australia has been reluctant to move because it was seeking to protect Australian industry. The fact that agreement has now been reached to make the change is a major achievement. I congratulate the Government and Officials from MFAT and MED who have worked so hard for so many years to improve these rules”, he continued.

“The only negative appears to be in the area of Men’s and Boys’ apparel where it seems the old rules will apply until 2010, before being liberalised slightly. Clearly Australian protectionist instincts are still strong in this area, where a number of companies in the Wellington area are active and strong.

We hope that the Government will work hard to bring the rules applying to this important sector into line with the rest of our export sectors”, Charles Finny concluded.

ENDS

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