Airport boss to lead ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay

Stuart Ainslie, the Chief Executive of Hawke’s Bay Airport, has been elected Chair of ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay.

He replaces Alasdair Macleod, the Chair of Napier Port.

Mr Ainslie, a professionally qualified engineer, has led Hawke’s Bay Airport for the past two years.

He has more than 18 years’ experience in international hub and regional airports in the UK, Australia and Papua New Guinea, and has managed his own aviation consultancy. He is a director of the NZ Airports Association and is Vice-Chair of Napier’s Art Deco Trust.

Mr Macleod has been chair of ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay since 2012. He joined the Napier Port board in 2014 and was elected Chair later that year. He is a director of several companies and was involved in authoring the Hawke’s Bay Regional Economic Development Strategy - Matariki. He will remain on the ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay board.

Mr Ainslie says he is looking forward to playing a more direct role in helping promote the region’s products to the world.

"ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay does a fantastic job of bringing together companies that are in export markets and those who are looking at getting into them, and I want to help continue that interaction.

"Helping newcomers over some of the hurdles to success on the world stage is ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay’s core role and I want to explore ways to expand that.

"The region has a huge variety of businesses with products as good as anywhere in the world, as we see every year at the awards night, and we must continue to back them."

ExportNZ Hawke’s Bay Executive Officer, Amanda Liddle, says Mr Macleod oversaw a key period of growth of the ExportNZ brand, which included the development of the annual ASB Export Awards, now a major event on the business calendar.

"We are stronger because of Alasdair. We now look forward to working with Stuart and the no doubt fresh perspective he will bring."

ENDS

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