As European leaders at the world economic forum in Davos warn of another impending crisis, Prime Minister John Key has been trying to sell them on a free trade agreement with New Zealand.
Despite the doom and gloom in Europe, Mr Key says an FTA still looks promising.
Davos is a playground for the rich, the famous and the powerful, but if you want a ticket to the coolest event in town, it's $27,000 to attend the World Economic Forum.
Mr Key's quest here is not to forget Europe. While he describes the ECB's $1.3 trillion quantitative easing programme as a short-term sugar hit, it could still be sweet for New Zealand.
"Everyone can see from an economic perspective if you compare Europe to, say, the United States or Asia, Europe the one with substantial structural issues, but Europe's time will come again and it's a big market from our point of view," says Mr Key.
Meeting with European leaders from Sweden, Luxembourg and Ireland today, Mr Key is selling the idea of a free trade deal with New Zealand as a way to restructure and grow.
"You've got an enormous amount of expenditure happening in places which really aren't sustainable for the economies," says Mr Key. "They've got so ultimately and they've got to build competitiveness, so ultimately trade is an entry into that."
Luckily the Irish Taoiseach has forgiven the All Blacks for the last narrow defeat over his national team, but he does have a request for potential new flag options.
"Put a bit of green in it and it will do all right."
Ireland is actually on track to have fastest growing economy in the Euro area this year, but with a looming election in Greece likely to throw their austerity plans out the window, the whole region is plagued with uncertainty.
Even in Switzerland, the economic future is predicted to be bleak. As a non-EU member it's been relatively protected from the Eurozone crisis, but a recent decision to ditch the Swiss Franc currency cap against the Euro will hurt exporters, not to mention the price of Swiss chocolate in New Zealand as we head into Easter.
3 News
source: newshub archive
