Monday, New Zealand’s trade minister said that Canada had “locked out” his country’s farmers in a dispute over dairy exports that was supposed to be settled by an independent panel.
Damien O’Connor said that Canada is “not living up” to its promises to let dairy products into the country as part of a 2018 trans-Pacific free trade agreement.
“This is hurting New Zealand exporters, who are still locked out of the Canadian market,” O’Connor said in a statement.
Canada, New Zealand, and nine other Asia-Pacific countries signed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership in 2018.
New Zealand first said in May that it didn’t like how Canada handled tariff rate quotas, which let dairy products come into the country with lower import taxes.
New Zealand sued Canada over losing access to the dairy market, which cost them about $40 million over two years. O’Connor said this “did not solve the problem.”
“New Zealand has decided to ask for a panel to be set up to hear the dispute and decide on it,” he said.
Monday, Jacinda Ardern, the prime minister of New Zealand, said she had already told Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, “to his face” that New Zealand would escalate the trade dispute.
“Given how often we talk, I don’t see why I wouldn’t bring it up. Our close relationship with Canada means I can be very honest,” Ardern told reporters in Wellington.
She said she had told Trudeau that “we were at a standstill” and that Ardern didn’t “see any reason” for officials to keep going back and forth, which would only “waste time.”
“If we can talk openly as leaders and know that we won’t be able to solve it by ourselves, it was time to take it to the next level,” Ardern said.
Representatives from Canada have not given an official response. The diplomats in Wellington said that Ottawa would have to respond.
The government in Wellington wants three experts to be on the neutral panel, whose members will be picked by Canada and New Zealand.
In 2021, global dairy exports gave New Zealand’s economy $10.96 billion, or about 23% of all exports.
