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Major trade missions slated for 2016

The Weatherill Government will lead major trade missions to the US, Japan and the Middle East next year, InDaily can reveal.

Nov 03, 2015, updated Nov 03, 2015
Former Liberal leader, now Cabinet minister, Martin Hamilton-Smith. Photo: Nat Rogers/InDaily

Former Liberal leader, now Cabinet minister, Martin Hamilton-Smith. Photo: Nat Rogers/InDaily

The delegations, which could set new records of participation for such trips, form part of a strategy to dramatically step up engagement with major trading partners, which will also see more missions to China, Europe, South-East Asia and India in the new year.

Trade Minister Martin Hamilton-Smith today unveils a travel calendar that he hopes will set a template for how the state conducts its business with its regional partners and beyond.

It will take in destinations from the UK, Germany, France and Spain to Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, with South Korea and North Africa also on the agenda.

Premier Jay Weatherill will personally lead at least three of the major tours, but each will be spearheaded by a minister in a “whole of Government” approach.

“It’s a calendar that I think will be of interest to a lot of people in the business community,” Hamilton-Smith told InDaily.

“The way to create jobs in the economy is to activate the small business sector, and particularly the export sector.”

The calendar is a response to departmental research into the state’s business trends, the details of which will be published in tomorrow’s InDaily.

“The starting point with this is the number of jobs that hinge on exports,” said Hamilton-Smith.

He said 65,200 jobs – “nearly 10 per cent of jobs in SA” – were linked to overseas trade.

“The next question is how do we expand that, how do we grow it, build on the success and strengthen it?” he said.

“If you could grow it by 10 per cent, that’s 6500 jobs…but it won’t just happen – it needs leadership.

“And most of that leadership needs to come from business, because business itself must see the opportunity, and that’s why I’ve engaged with all the business associations.”

But he also emphasised the Government had a pivotal role to play, particularly in facilitating access to Asian markets such as China and South-East Asia.

“Businesses in China like to know the Government-to-Government side of the relationship is in good order before they feel comfortable doing business,” he said.

“When you take 250 people to China it helps if you have the Premier leading the mission.”

That mission to China remains the biggest of its kind in the state’s history, but Hamilton-Smith says “when I took over this portfolio the biggest mission we’d ever taken to China was around 60 and that was a big effort”.

The biggest at the time to India was 15.

This year, however, has seen an 80-strong delegation to India, and a 120-strong mission to South-East Asia.

Previously, the minister says, “we’d really been very intermittent…missions were often organised at relatively short notice and based around the availability of the Premier or the minister”.

“There was no regularity in the relationship…the Premier wanted this changed, he wanted a new strategic engagement with the region.”

He said the ultimate aim was growing sustainable jobs, but insisted the budget for the trade missions was modest.

“We only spend about $12.6 million in this area every year; it’s not a lot…so the sense that millions are being squandered on this, my argument is 65,000 jobs are linked to that investment,” he said.

He hopes the itinerary released today will be the first of a “regular calendar of inbound and outbound trade missions”, which will aid business planning and schedule visiting delegations around major events such as the Tour Down Under and the Twenty20 cricket.

“This would be in effect a template to be used each year,” he said.

“It will be tested next year (and) if it works next year we’ll do it again in 2017.”

He said his department would “now go out and seek interest in attending those missions”, with the expectation that last year’s record delegation to China could be surpassed.

He said while governments such as Victoria “are in the habit of paying people to attend”, the SA travellers would “pay their own expenses, but they will be well supported”.

“Everyone that comes will be vetted and assisted with their business planning,” he said.

“We’re looking for companies that are serious about selling their wares and creating jobs.

“If a business is already trading, say, in China and wants to have a look at Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, they can come on that trip…even if they’re selling in a market and want to reinforce and expand that market, they can come along…we’re going to plan a whole series of events around a week and they can be part of it.”

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