NSW Wine has rejected claims made earlier this week by Premier Gladys Berejiklian that New South Wales will not be impacted by the China tariffs imposed in late November.
Prime 7 News’ Sarah Navin reported on the Premier’s speaking engagement at the Corporate Club Australia event held at Luna Park on Tuesday, 8 December. Navin reported that when asked how worried she was about suspensions and expensive tariffs on Australian exports, the Premier responded: “I’m not concerned about that from a New South Wales state perspective.”
Pressed by journalist Chris Bath who was interviewing Ms Berejiklian at the event, she said, “We don’t feel we’re impacted by that at all.”
NSW Wine, the industry body representing growers and producers, strongly disagrees. Executive Officer Angus Barnes said, “After enduring bushfires, drought, Covid and now China, we took it as extremely poor form, especially as we have been lobbying for collaboration with government for a couple of years. We found the Premier’s comments particularly hard to take.”
New South Wales exports $180 million worth of wine to China every year and the tariffs of up to 212 per cent will make many NSW wines unaffordable in the Chinese market. NSW Wine say that this will have a significant impact on many family owned and run NSW wineries and vineyards alongside the regional communities they live and work in. Additionally, the potential substantial losses of Chinese tourism dollars to the NSW economy, and in particular regional NSW economies, is yet to be calculated.
NSW Wine says that it has been pursuing a partnership with the government for over two years. Barnes said that the Victorian wine industry is well supported by its state government in a trilateral working relationship between Wine Victoria, Wine Australia and the Victorian government.
He said, “We are still waiting for the NSW Government to agree to a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between industry and government after more than two years of requests. An effective MOU would outline the best ways to work together and how the government can support the industry to be competitive and sustainable, and now would be the perfect time for the NSW Government to stand up and support this important industry.”
NSW Wine President Mark Bourne said, “Following this latest in a line of blows to the NSW wine industry and its 53,000 direct and indirect employees, we are desperately searching for a reprieve from a tumultuous 12 months, along with support to survive and rebound.”
At the aforementioned lunch the Premier said, “Fortunately as the state premier, I don’t have to talk about foreign affairs issues.” However, Bourne argues that she does indeed need to confront the local impact of those foreign affairs issues.
“I am respectfully issuing an invitation to our elected NSW representatives to meet as soon as possible to experience and hear first-hand from our hard working grape growers, winemakers on how this latest, and previous compounding rounds of setbacks, are impacting our industry and our regional communities,” Bourne said.
Photo thanks to Prime 7 ACT.
