Brazil embassy adds colour to day

By WARREN GAMBLE

Beneath the crushing grey weight of estimates, appropriations and outputs yesterday there was a tiny samba beat.

It came with the Budget announcement that New Zealand will open its first embassy in Brasilia, the capital of the land of soccer, an awful lot of coffee and the Girl from Ipanema.

An extra $1 million has been set aside for the new embassy to open in October next year as part of continuing New Zealand efforts to develop a trade frontier in largely untapped Latin American markets.

New Zealand opened an embassy in Argentina two years ago, and has others in Mexico and Chile.

Foreign Minister Phil Goff said Brazil was the world's ninth-largest economy, and had the fifth-largest population with 170 million people.

At present, trade with Brazil is small, consisting mainly of dairy product and equipment exports and fruit juice imports.

But Mr Goff said the new post, added to a Tradenz base in Sao Paulo, would give New Zealand businesses the best chance of increasing their share of Brazil's $115 billion total import market. He said it would also help the country's political relationship, bolstered by Prime Minister Helen Clark's meeting with President Fernando Cardoso earlier this year. New Zealand and Brazil worked together on issues such as whaling, disarmament and indigenous rights.

But while one embassy will open, Mr Goff also announced the closure of the New Zealand consulate-general in Osaka, Japan. It will be replaced with an honorary consul and the Tokyo embassy will cover the Osaka area.

Budget 2000 feature

Minister's budget statement

Budget speech