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From left: Tony Martin, Regional Director, IMEA, NZTE, Sarath Ganegoda, Executive Director, Hayleys Group, David Bennett New Zealand’s Minister for Veteran’s Affairs and Food Safety and Associate Minister of Transport and Immigration, Lindsay Quinton, Senior Sales Engineer at Tait Radio Communications and Sachia Yonge, Acting New Zealand Trade Commissioner
The business delegation of fourteen New Zealand companies led by the David Bennett, New Zealand’s Minister for Veteran’s Affairs and Food Safety and Associate Minister of Transport and Immigration, which arrived in Sri Lanka this week to further strengthen business links between the two countries have expressed satisfaction with their visit so far .
This is the third visit by a New Zealand business delegation in the last 18 months and underlines the strong ties between the two countries. The signing of a partnership agreement between New Zealand’s Tait Radio and Fenton’s Group of Sri Lanka (a subsidiary of the Hayleys Group), took place in Colombo as part of a busy programme of activity for New Zealand Minister Bennett and the 14-strong business delegation accompanying him on his visit to Sri Lanka.
The signing of this agreement marks a two-year partnership between the two companies and illustrates the importance of strong business-to-business links between New Zealand companies and their Sri Lankan counterparts.
Minister Bennett who has met with nine Sri Lankan Ministers during his two-day visit is upbeat about business links with Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka is New Zealand’s 23rd largest goods export market and is worth NZD$254 million. New Zealand is Sri Lanka’s 54th largest goods export market worth NZD$55 million. New Zealand’s top exports to Sri Lanka are milk powder, butter and fruit. Sri Lanka’s top exports to New Zealand are tea, retreaded tyres and gloves.
The delegation comprises some of New Zealand’s leading Corporates including Staah, Tait Communications, Vista, Powershield, Aeroqual, Framecad, Pan Pac Forest Products Limited, Color Communications, Precision Medicine International Limited, Pictor, Fisher and Paykel Healthcare, Syft Technologies, and the International Aviation Academy of New Zealand.