NZ-India FTA talks to benefit from more MFAT funding: David Parker

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The seemingly stalled New Zealand-India bilateral talks on Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the two countries are set to benefit from the recent increase in funding of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) – the department responsible for inking NZ’s trade negotiations around the world.

“We have got quite a significant increase in the funding for Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, which will enable New Zealand Trade officials to do more at once because there will be more of them,” Mr Parker said.

The Minister was in The Indian Weekender studio on Friday, May 18, immediately after the budget announcement in Parliament and spoke about a number of issues around the budget, ban on overseas buyers in NZ residential market and the current state of the art of the bilateral talks on NZ-India FTA.

Here are some excerpts from the interview.

IWK: Do you think your Ministry of Economic Development has got enough resources in this budget to keep our economy growing?