LIKE your correspondent Sione Mokofisi from the US, I too would like to see more trade between Tonga and NZ and especially our agricultural exports. It will offer an opportunity for both countries to mitigate what is now a long-running multi-million dollar imbalance in favour of New Zealand. That's a commonly held fact which backgrounds the trade discussions between NZ and Tonga over the years. Which is why I'm surprised at the claims of a trade barrier and price-control policies restricting inflows of Tongan watermelons.
There are no formal trade barriers or price control regimes on exports of watermelons from Tonga other than those based on protecting New Zealand from unwanted pests. The rest is totally market driven. A Ministerial delegation of Tongan growers and grower organisations toured New Zealand earlier this year to gauge export opportunities for our fledgling agricultural export sector and I had the good fortune to sit alongside the delegation and witnessed the exchanges between our enthusiastic growers and the potential buyers of our products. Watermelons did feature in the discussions and the fact is that the competition for Tongan watermelons in this market at this time of year isn't the New Zealand grown variety because this year's crop is not even in the ground yet! We do have some products from Australia and elsewhere but at present, watermelons are in short supply and is commanding a premium even though our spring weather is still a bit nippy. Our growers all know that.
And to further suggest that 200 Tongan watermelons will flood the NZ market (population of just over 4m) is citrullus lanatus hyperbole indeed. Sione will know from personal experience how large a Tongan watermelon could be but they're not so big that 200 is capable of flooding this market. Talk about making a tsunami out of a ripple!
The true barriers to watermelon exports out of Tonga is for another time and space but it's not socialist trade policies or protectionism by New Zealand at all and as a resident of the US, Sione's reading is a little behind. Not only did we do away with price control in the 80s and 90s as you've outlined, we're almost regretting some of the deregulation that were introduced then – in much the same way that your Congress is now regretting the absence of "socialistic" oversight which may have prevented the Wall St free market meltdown and the subsequent takeover of your financial institutions by government. Sione will understand if we part on another relevant reminder – Chinese tyres imports?
