Some good news for New Zealand

This graph illustrates some positive structural factors for NZ methinks:

HT Greg Mankiw’s blog.

11 replies
  1. steve
    steve says:

    yes. while most of that growth is clearly in China or India (and this will continue, together they are more than a third of the world population), which means large export markets are becoming closer and closer to NZ relative to the expense of exporting to the US or EU.

  2. Paul Walker
    Paul Walker says:

    Matt Nolan :
    @steve
    Spot on comment Steve, spot on.

    Yes but it will take a long time before the income per capita of China and India reach the levels of the US and the EU, so the US and EU will still be big importers of our products and India and China less so.

  3. Matt Nolan
    Matt Nolan says:

    @Paul Walker

    Yes the US and EU will remain important, and yes Chinese and Indian per capita GDP is a long way below US and EU per capita income.

    However, we have already seen our trade position switch sharply towards Asia – nearly 25% of our trade now goes to Asia ex Aussie!

    Given the faster growth in total income in Asia (which is what matters given that we are looking at commodity demand) and given that it is cheaper to ship to Asia then to the US or EU this is a positive structural development for NZ.

  4. Miguel Sanchez
    Miguel Sanchez says:

    Paul Walker :

    Yes but it will take a long time before the income per capita of China and India reach the levels of the US and the EU, so the US and EU will still be big importers of our products and India and China less so.

    It’s not like there’s a substitution going on. Our Anglo markets are growing and our Asian markets are growing faster.

  5. Bill Bennett
    Bill Bennett says:

    @Paul Walker
    Well yes, but China’s appetite for food is immense and that’s what we do really well. Mind you I understand Chinese have a problem digesting milk – can’t we put our food technologists on to that?

  6. Miguel Sanchez
    Miguel Sanchez says:

    Food technologists are already on top of it – for example in Finland, which has a high rate of intolerance, they’ve developed a way to remove most lactose from milk. Anyway, lactose intolerance generally isn’t widespread before adolescence, and I gather that China’s push to drink more milk is largely aimed at children.

  7. Calgary web
    Calgary web says:

    i would say that NZ is in a great position to provide a huge amount of exports to the growing Giant, you guys just need to understand how to capitalize on it. Lactose or not!

  8. Bjorn Gernstein
    Bjorn Gernstein says:

    China is a sleeping giant, but it begins to stir. Not too long in the future it will import next to nothing while exporting nearly everything. I think we should be worried.

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