New Zealand’s top two export commodities, meat and dairy, both fell by value in 2016, Statistics New Zealand said today.
The total value of all export goods was $48.4 billion for the year ended December 2016, down $544 million from the previous year. This is the second annual fall in a row for exports. The latest annual total is $1.6 billion less than the high of the 2014 year.
The biggest fall by value was for meat and edible offal, our second largest export group, with sales down $909 million to $5.9 billion. The fall in meat was driven by beef (down $481 million) and lamb (down $415 million). The United States accounted for three-quarters of the fall in beef, while the European Union (EU) accounted for nearly half of the fall in lamb. The amount of meat fell 7.4 percent from 2015, with beef falling 14 percent and lamb falling 4.6 percent.
“The large fall in meat exports for 2016 reflects a decline from the record meat season in 2015 for both value and quantity,” international statistics senior manager Nicola Growden said. “The 2016 year’s meat exports have returned to levels similar to those seen in 2014.”
The quantity of milk powder, butter, and cheese exported rose to a new high of 3.0 million tonnes, despite a near 3 percent fall in the value of dairy exports to $11.2 billion.
The quantity of milk powder, butter, and cheese has been rising since 2013 and is now 14 percent higher than it was then. The quantity exported to China was 25 percent of the total in 2016, slightly up from 23 percent in 2015.
The value of imported goods was $51.6 billion in 2016, down $883 million (1.7 percent) from the high of the December 2015 year. The fall was led by cheaper oil and petrol, and partly offset by a rise in cars, trucks, and parts.
Oil and petrol fell $840 million in 2016, mainly due to crude oil (down $666 million). The value of crude oil has been falling for the past four years, and is now 55 percent lower than the 2012 value ($5.7 billion). The amount of crude oil imported rose 2.3 percent in 2016, and has been increasing for the past two years.
In 2016 there was an annual trade deficit of $3.2 billion (6.6 percent of exports). This is smaller than the deficit of $3.5 billion for the December 2015 year. The trade shortfall in 2015 was the largest December year deficit since 2008.
Overseas Merchandise Trade: December 2016 – for more data and analysis
Fonterra’s Research and Development Centre has developed a new white butter product to meet growing demand from manufacturers in the Middle East market.
The New Zealand dairy co-op developed the product alongside its global ingredients business NZMP.
Fonterra’s butter is renowned amongst Middle East consumers for its golden appearance thanks to milk from grass fed cows.
However, a niche segment of manufacturers prefer white butter as a processing ingredient for their food products.
These Middle Eastern food manufacturers have traditionally sourced butter from grain fed cows which produce dairy products with a pale colour, according to Fonterra.
The co-op seized an opportunity to respond to customer needs by developing a high quality white butter ingredient, Fonterra’s Dairy Foods Category Director of NZMP, Casey Thomas said.
Produced through an innovative manufacturing process, Fonterra is now able to reduce the golden appearance of the butter without impacting its quality.
“While our yellow butter already sees great success in this market, we saw an opportunity to tap into this new area for customers to use in a variety of applications such as spreadable jar cheese, recombined cream cheese, and could soon be used in ice cream,” he said.
This innovative approach is already seeing strong results, NZMP General Manager of Middle East and Africa, Santiago Aon said.
Our customers have had positive feedback about the white butter, it is performing to our expectations as a high quality ingredient for food businesses across the Middle East region.
The Fonterra Research and Development Centre and NZMP team both have a long history of partnering with customers to not only provide them with steady supplies of ingredients, but creating business solutions with them.
The product is now available in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Bahrain, Turkey and Pakistan.
Meanwhile, the Kiwi co-op plans to the launch the product in Egypt, Algeria, Morocco and even South America in the future.
| First published on Agriland | January 29, 2017 ||
Isolation imposed time lag continues as New Zealand characteristic
The delivery of the earthquake struck coastal township of Kaikoura with the second syllable pronounced as in “cow” has become the signal shibboleth or password designed to reveal the utterer, and the organisation that employs them, as being politically correct.
Kai- COW – ra has now replaced as the dominant pc call sign the previous place-name pronunciation which was KIDDY –KIDDY for the far northern township of Kerikeri.
Both these hallmark pronunciations had their genesis in New Zealand’s government broadcasting operation.
This was in spite of the state broadcasting corporation’s late doyen of the Maori language Bill Kerikeri always pronouncing his own name with the two rs firmly sounded.
The continuing trend for New Zealand official commentators – broadcasters to dolly up the delivery of longstanding Maori names continues to demonstrate the way in which the fashionable delivery of targeted place names especially remains such an encoded hallmark of modish conformity.
Other Maori-derivation place names continue to be pronounced with the kou syllable pronounced in the traditional way as coo.
Some officials continue to go counter-stream meanwhile. For example the ubiquitous cabinet member Steven Joyce MP continues to use the koo rendition of Kaikoura.
The flourishing of the state-broadcasting engendered movement to put a smooth modernist emollient spin on strong Maori word pronunciation is another indicator that New Zealand remains in its customary time-lag in regard to international societal trends.
This in turn continues to support the belief that communications globalisation is no substitute for geographical isolation, the tyranny of distance.
Another indicator of this was the broadcasting use of the term happy festivity as a substitute for happy christmas thus sidestepping the invocation of any christianity.
Meanwhile in order of frequency of usage these were the other modish substitutes that have become standardised in the government broadcasting system.
Conversation DiscussionBirthing Maternity...(nothing to do with ships)Choices Decisions/options/ alternativesEarly childhood KindergartenFamily now refers to staff/employees/ previously “team”Interventions Social welfare involvementIssues ProblemsParenting this gerund replaces the old “bringing up” of children (“raising” in the US)Procedure Surgical operationResilient SustainableSecurity Supply of something, as in food “security.”Wellness HealthFishers FishermenMedical event Usuallly refers to coronary or stroke
| From the This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | Monday 30 January, 2017 ||
Ξ CentrePort Resumes Regular Container Service
Ξ White butter is taking off in the Middle East
Ξ Trump seeks Aust, NZ trade deals: adviser
Ξ Labour and Greens fire united opening salvo at 'tired govt'
Ξ US tariffs on Mexico could hurt Fisher & Paykel
Ξ Andrew Little's Speech at State of the Nation 2017
Palace of the Alhambra, Spain
By: Charles Nathaniel Worsley (1862-1923)
From the collection of Sir Heaton Rhodes
Oil on canvas - 118cm x 162cm
Valued $12,000 - $18,000
Offers invited over $9,000
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242
Mount Egmont with Lake
By: John Philemon Backhouse (1845-1908)
Oil on Sea Shell - 13cm x 14cm
Valued $2,000-$3,000
Offers invited over $1,500
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242