Todd McClay: Trade Minister chats landmark visit of Indian Prime Minister Modi

It is a historic day for New Zealand's international relations as one of the world's most powerful leaders, India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is set to touch down in Auckland, the first visit by an Indian Prime Minister in 40 years.

Modi's visit comes off the back of the landmark FTA deal.

Trade Minister Todd McClay joined Andrew Dickens to discuss the visit. 

"You know, the wider business community is going to be turning out. There's a formal lunch tomorrow with a lot of business leaders and sectors that are going to benefit from the FDA," McClay said.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:16):
Significant day for the country's international relations. One of the
world's most powerful leaders, India's Prime Minister no Endra Modi,
is touching down an Auckland later on tonight, marking the
first visit by an Indian prime minister in forty years.
Off the back of the landmark FTA deal. Tom McLay is,
the Trade Minister, will be meeting with Good morning to you,

(00:37):
Todd Hey, good money, big deal.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
Ah, it is a very big deal. And you think
about it, one point a government responsible for one point
four billion people, prime minister coming down to a country
of five million people to celebrate the relationship across the board,
but particularly the opportunities and trade it is. I think
there's a bit of excitement building.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yes, there is. He's been in Australia and there he
was treated like a rock star. He sold out Marvel
Stadium for goodness. Say you know he's got a gig
at Spark Arena. He's a traveling rock star. But would
he have come to New Zealand with or without the
FTA If he's been to Australia too.

Speaker 3 (01:12):
I think the answer is without the FTA, no, he
probably wouldn't have. You know, it is an opportunity to
sort of one celebrate the relationship, as I said earlier,
but if the negotiations were still ongoing, Prime Minister Modi
probably wouldn't be here. And so look we should view
this as a real opportunity. Although he's only sort of
a day and a half in New Zealand, you know,

(01:34):
the wide business community is going to be turning out.
There's a formal lunch tomorrow with a lot of business
leaders and sectors that are going to benefit from the FDA,
and of course there is an Indian and New Zealand
Indian organized event for Prime Minister Modi, as he said
in spark Arena, I and my elected of ROGU was
out and about it but yesterday and they've secured about

(01:58):
fifty tickets. But a lot of excitement and as you say,
rockstar status, well.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
It's actually a bit of disappointment as well. A few
people are actually saying, look it's sold out. You know,
was this only available to Indians that you didn't know
about it? And the Indians heard about it immediately and
they went because they love them.

Speaker 3 (02:13):
Yeah, it's very very interesting when I say this slightly jokingly.
In India they like their politicians quite a lot. But
you know, it's already big deal for New Zealand. You know,
the FDA is one of the best in the world
that India's negotiated. It gives us a lot of opportunity.
And if you think about it this way, my leged

(02:35):
of rotor, we grow a lot of kiwi fruit. You know,
if everyone in New Zealand it's one kiwi fruit per year,
I guess that's five million kiwi fruit. Last year we
sold a billion kiwi fruit to China and that means
that actually there are more jobs and more secure So
virtually across the board in the years to come, we're
going to see this do amazing things for these old economy.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Now, there's been political noise around the FDA, driven particularly
by one political leader. Has that been noticed by the
Indian government.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Well, it hasn't been, although we keep a very close contact.
Everything that was negotiating as well understood on both sides.
You know, we took what would normally be a sort
of a two year negotiation and just worked even harder
and we're able to do it in nine months, and
we have a very very good and very clear understanding
of what's negotiated, the rights and responsibilities, what's not in it.

(03:28):
The Indian High Commissioner was on TV this week sort
of talking about that, and I think she dispelled a
lot of the myths that have been floating around out there.
You know, they've gone to this with our eyes wide open,
as we have. I would expect two things. And one
Indian knows that there's election here and so it's going
to be a bit of noise. Second thing is if
you're a government responsible for one point four billion people,

(03:51):
you know you probably move quickly on to the next
deal or the next thing you have to do. So.
Whilst they like the FDA and they're celebrating the relationship
and it's growing very very quickly between the two countries,
I'm not sure they're paying anywhere there as much attention
to the noise here as we probably are imagine they are.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Will the Foreign Minister be meeting the Prime Minister of India?
And if not, why not?

Speaker 3 (04:14):
No? Minister Peters is overseas. He's on a mission to
Japan and Singapore. Look, that's not unusual we had the
Chinese premiere here a year a year or two ago,
and Minister Peters didn't meet him. This is Prime Minister
to Prime minister. But there's been occasions when you know,
we've had leaders and others in the country, when I've

(04:35):
been overseas as well. So you know, nothing too much
to see here other than Wizard's overseas.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
The deal is yet to be ratified, So when's that happening?
And then what is our next big goals in our
relationship with India.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, so we have the legislation before Parliament at the moment.
It's not a large bill. It really reduces the tariff
right and sets up some of the tariff quotas, so
for Kiwi, for apples, for honey, we've got preferential access there.
Quotas a mountain we can sell them. We set up
under law the way that we will manage that so

(05:07):
that we can meet the obligations and it's fair to
produce us. That's gone off to the committee. At the moment.
We're working very hard across Parliament, particularly with Label to
see if we can get it through before the election.
The reason for that is we have a clause put
in the Agreement Most Favored Nations and in our services
trade and also wine, India has given a better deal

(05:29):
to the EU. We get that automatically, so we get
even more benefit as long as ours is enforced before
the use. Well, so we're working very quickly on that.
I mean wine one hundred and fifty percent paraffright down
to about twenty percent, which is a significant reduction. So
we're going to work pretty hard on that. Then the
next big thing in the relationship is to get on
and start building business to business relations and trading a

(05:52):
lot more. You'll see trade missions up. They're already key.
We companies are going up. The trade is already increasing,
incidentally or interestingly, but a lot more that we can do.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yes, and indeed, of course businesses have to invest in India,
that's part of the deal as well. But Todd have
some fun today and I thank you for your time.
Trade Minister Tom McClay.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
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