Thursday 19 January 2017

Welsh Lamb producers the first victim of May's Brexit stategy?

An Indication that the Westminster Government  plans to create new Trade Deals came even before Theresa Mays speech laying out  out her Brexit strategy speech  which involves pulling out of the EU single market -
Only Days before   Prime Minister May's  spech came news that  New Zealand hopes to negotiate a "high quality" free trade agreement with the UK once it leaves the EU, 
Following a meeting with Theresa May, he said he hoped this would happen "as soon as possible".
Mrs May said both countries already enjoy a strong and growing trading relationship worth over £3bn last year.
International Trade Secretary Liam Fox will be visiting New Zealand in the coming months, she said.
Mrs May said her colleague would begin a bilateral dialogue between the two nations with the ultimate aim of striking a trade deal.
But the Farmers' Union of Wales fears a "hard Brexit", plus a potential deal with New Zealand, could be damaging for Welsh farmers.
About 90% of Welsh food and drink is currently exported to the EU.
FUW president Glyn Roberts said the industry was facing a "perfect storm" if a trade deal was struck with New Zealand and a hard Brexit was pursued.
Mr Roberts said Welsh lamb would have to compete with a country that is in direct competition with it and able to sell at a much cheaper price.
He told BBC Wales:
 "In no way can we compete on price with New Zealand, but we can compete on value, and what we have as a premium product in Welsh lamb.
"It depends on what the consumers want: does the consumer want cheap food or does the consumer feel that by buying Welsh products and Welsh lamb, that they are getting a premium product," 

 Mr Roberts said UK farmers could sell much more to the 500m people living in the European Union - some 20m across the channel - than about 4.5m people living in New Zealand.

"It is a perfect storm because what we in Wales want to export is exactly the same thing as New Zealand want to export to Wales," he said.
"Getting a deal with one country is one thing, getting the product there and marketing the product is another thing."
Everytime we who goes to the  butchers or Supermarket will be aware that New Zealand Lamb is already cheaper  so it may be that there may be no difference.

Though who knows what a desperate UK government would sign up to? It is unlikely that it will get better .


The idea that it is the UK which will be in a position  of strength when it comes to signing up to hundreds of Trade agreements is frankly laughable.


Boris Johnson has stated.countries are “queuing up” to sign trade deals with the UK once it leaves the EU,.


One wonders why?


The UK manufacturing base was destroyed by the Thatcherite polices of the 1980's


So what is the Government plans maybe its to change the UK to resemble the Far East nation of low wages and poor workers protection agaist exploitation and safety 



The Chancellor indicated the Government could retaliate by slashing business taxes if the EU moved to shut Britain out of the single market.

In an interview with the German Welt am Sonntag, Mr Hammond said:
 "If we have no access to the European market, if we are closed off, if Britain were to leave the European Union without an agreement on market access, then we could suffer from economic damage at least in the short-term."In this case, we could be forced to change our economic model and we will have to change our model to regain competitiveness. And you can be sure we will do whatever we have to do."The British people are not going to lie down and say, too bad, we've been wounded. We will change our model, and we will come back, and we will be competitively engaged."

As the Tory Press wave their Union flags, one wonders if they really support the UK entering a trade war with the EU and becoming a client state of Trump USA whilst betraying the likes of Welsh Farmers? Sadly the answer is probably yes.




1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Just like a majority in the Valleys who relied on EU regeneration money, a majority of Welsh farmers who rely on EU subsidies and tariff free access to the EU market voted to Leave as well.

The outcome, cheap New Zealand lamb flooding welsh supermarkets and like the Valleys its hard to have any sympathy, their choice was either fill out large EU forms or kill their industry. Suddenly those forms don't look so arduous do they Mr farmer.