Barry Soper: Feeding the Chinese Dragon

John Key with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Photo / Getty Images

It was commonly referred to as feeding the dragon and since 2008 the beast has been fairly hungry.

Our exports to China have more than tripled since National was handed the wok on taking office in November that year, just a month after the free trade deal was ratified with the world's most populous nation.

We were heading into the global financial crisis but the fire of the dragon's breath kept us warm in the international financial storm.

Few would argue today that the Chinese deal hasn't been good for this country, even though we were fairly evenly split on the issue at the time, and Labour should rightly take credit for doing the leg work.

But incredibly several of their MPs were doing the leg work out on the streets over the weekend as thousands turned out to protest the latest trade deal being negotiated among 12 countries, including God's Own.

New Zealand's a trading nation and having access to the world's biggest economy, the United States, can't be sniffed at and neither can getting into the trading family with Japan or Mexico.

It seems they're wound up about the deal being done in secret which beggars belief given that negotiations are just that. They usually argue the toss while keeping something up their sleeve to throw into the mix when the going gets tough.

They did that with the Chinese deal, even though one of our trade union leaders at the time, Angry Andy Little, said the communists revealed more behind the scenes than what's being revealed now. Maybe ideology has something to do with that, but even with the Chinese, the text of the deal wasn't revealed until it was being signed in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.

And that'll be the case with the Trans Pacific Partnership which for us has two main stumbling blocks. Dairy access which of course is an essential ingredient for us. The other is pharmaceuticals which the Americans are insisting on having longer patent periods for, meaning we'll have to wait longer before we buy the cheaper, generic drugs.

Teflon John Key didn't necessarily help that argument by making light of it saying prescription charges would still remain at five bucks. That ignores the fact that the drugs will still be more expensive which of course is an additional impost on the taxpayer.

But the benefits of free trade will always outweigh living in a fortress. God's Own, hopefully a more prosperous one, will still occupy the same place in the South Pacific long after we're all dead and gone.