Dear Members,

For the Tennis fans among you, life can return to normal after Wimbledon. Much as I appreciate the enormous talent and dedication of Nadal and Federer, it is nice to see some new young talent winning the men’s crown. New Zealander Marina Erakovic and her Thai partner Tamarine Tanasugarn made it to the women’s doubles semi-finals representing the best result by a New Zealander at Wimbledon for over 25 years. For the rugby fans, I am sure you will agree that despite losing to the Queensland Reds in the Super 15 finals, it was still a great effort by the Canterbury Crusaders given the tumultuous and emotional year they have had.

Returning to matters closer to home, I was certainly relieved that the election passed without incident and that the Democrats appear to have accepted the result gracefully. This will help allay some of the concerns of investors. The next big steps will be the allocation of ministerial seats and how Pheu Thai plans to implement their pre election policies.

One of the policies that has been generating considerable debate is increasing the minimum wage to 300 Baht per day. At a recent meeting with the Board of Trade, this issue was raised and the Joint Foreign Chambers were invited to comment. One Chamber expressed the opinion that since the majority of their members were large multi-nationals who generally paid above this level anyway, it wasn’t really an issue for them. Whilst this may be true in their case, I think the vast majority of Chambers, NZTCC included, have significant SME membership for whom this is a very big problem. A sudden large and unplanned increase in costs could have a disastrous effect on many of them.   

I recently attended the “Thailand’s Investment Environment” seminar organized by the Joint Standing Committee on Commerce, Industry and Banking (JSCCIB) and listened to discussion on several interesting topics. Amongst them was the challenges faced by industry in resolving labour shortage issues. The point was made that dependence on cheap immigrant labour is not a sustainable model for the long term and that the emphasis should be a shift towards capital investment. Better skilled workers with greater investment will increase the real earnings of Thais. Of course this will only really work if skill levels are increased. Another panellist pointed out that building skills starts from the moment a child starts school and continues to develop throughout their lives. Basic education is therefore critical because without it skills development is difficult.

After an excellent evening with the Irish last month, we are following it up with a joint event with our Canadian friends for this month’s Corporate Knight on 28th July. This proved to be a successful and popular event last year and we are looking forward to a repeat performance. Many thanks to Khun Somporn Timsaeng. and his team at  Timsaeng 2000 (the distributors of Fisher & Paykel products in Thailand) and our colleagues from New Zealand Trade & Enterprise for jointly sponsoring this event for NZTCC. . Fisher & Paykel manufacture high quality whiteware so if you come along and talk nicely to the Timsaeng 2000 folks you may get a good deal on some excellent whiteware products! We would also like to thank Baker Tilly (Thailand) who are the sponsors for the Thai Canadian Chamber of Commerce.

We look forward to seeing you all at the Sheraton Hotel on the 28th. Come along and meet our Canadian friends.

Kind regards,

Kindly sponsored by

Fisher & Paykel manufactures luxury household and kitchen appliances. Founded in 1934, today Fisher & Paykel is an internationally recognised premium brand selling its products in over 80 countries with five manufacturing sites located in Thailand, the United States, Australia, Italy and Mexico.

With almost 80 years of development, Fisher & Paykel’s products have many unique characteristics and are widely acknowledged for delivering leading edge functionality, technology, design and environmental standards to their upscale consumers. Fisher & Paykel has won numerous awards globally for its innovative technologies and consumer-centric designs, including the Most Trusted Whitegoods Brand Award 2010 in the Reader’s Digest Australia survey.

   

Some recent Kiwi Snippets and Kiwis in the news:

An Emperor penguin that washed up lost on a New Zealand beach will be released into the ocean when fully fit so it can swim the 3,000 kilometres (1,900 miles) home to Antarctica, wildlife experts said Wednesday.

The penguin, nicknamed "Happy Feet", was found wandering on a beach near Wellington last week and was taken to the city's zoo when it became sick after eating sand and sticks.

In the meantime, the zoo said it would live in an air conditioned room carpeted with crushed ice to cool it in the relative warmth of New Zealand, where the mercury currently sits around 10 degrees Celsius (50 Fahrenheit).

The reason for Happy Feet's appearance in New Zealand remains a mystery, although experts say Emperor penguins take to the open sea during the Antarctic summer and this one may have simply wandered further than most.

Number 8 Fencing Wire To The Rescue? 

New Zealand soldiers in Afghanistan have been praised for their quick thinking and ingenuity after towing a disabled US helicopter to safety with a light armoured vehicle.

The US army Apache helicopter had to land in an exposed position in Bamyan last month after its engines were damaged by debris.

The NZ Provincial Reconstruction Team manufactured a tow bar and towed the helicopter into the safety of the Kiwi base.

The US maintenance crew chief sergeant, from the army's 10th Mountain Division, praised the Kiwis' efforts, saying they had never seen that level of craftsmanship from a maintenance team before. 

Sheep runs wild in Wellington streets .

A mystery sheep ran wild through the streets of central Wellington before it was apprehended by police, who took the animal to cells in the back of a patrol car.
Wellington police e received three or four calls from concerned members of the public who saw the sheep bolting down Ghuznee Street and along Vivian Street at around 11.30pm at night. 

A police unit was dispatched find the sheep were about to give up until they found it cornered in the Briscoes carpark on Taranaki Street by a group of people.
"Some members of the public had jumped on it and held it down in the carpark," police said.

Kiwi/Thai Combination Reaches Wimbledon Semis

Kiwi tennis player Marina Erakovic  and Thai partner Tamarine Tanasugarn reached their first Grand Slam doubles semi-final after they  won their quarterfinal in a tough three-set effort.

Erakovic and Tanasugarn beat American third seeds Liezel Huber and Lisa Raymond 4-6, 7-6 and 13-11 at the All England Club today.

"It's terrific and both Tammy and I are very happy, it's been a long day so we're just very happy and once we play on Friday we'll be ready to go."  Said Marina

The achievement is even more impressive considering that the New Zealand-Thai pairing lost in the final round of qualifying last week and snuck into the main draw when another pair withdrew.

NEW NZ COPYRIGHT LAW MEANS ISP's COULD CASH IN

New Zealand ISPs could have a tidy new revenue stream courtesy of their illegal downloading customers as new copyright laws take effect in September.

New Zealand Commerce Minister Simon Power yesterday announced that a NZ$25 fee will be charged by ISPs to rights-holders, such as movie studios, for processing each allegation of copyright infringement.

New Zealand has one of the highest rates of peer-to-peer infringement in the world, which could mean that ISPs will be raking in fees from the movie, music and digital content industry.

Estimates widely differ on how many copyright infringements currently occur, but one figure in the ministry's regulation consultation put the activity at 5,000 breaches per month, per ISP.

The decision was made by Cabinet when considering technical regulations to underpin the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Act 2011, which comes into effect on 1 September. The government said it would review the fee structure after six months of commercial implementation.

The $25 fee was a compromise between varying demands from the industry, the Telecommunications Carriers Forum had demanded a $40 fee, while some rights-holders have requested zero or $2 fees per transaction.

"For rights-holders, the fee level ensures the regime is a more cost-effective enforcement measure than what is currently available through the courts, and allows them to pursue a reasonable number of alleged copyright infringements to educate internet users. For ISPs, the fee level prevents them from being inundated with alleged copyright breaches to the point they find it difficult to comply with the regime, and allows them to recover a reasonable proportion of their costs," Power said.

As part of the process, once a copyright breach has been found, the ISP will then send three warning letters to the alleged offender. If warning letters fail to resolve the issue, the rights-holder – such as a movie studio or record company – can takes its case to the Copyright Tribunal, which will cost $200.

Under the new laws, the Copyright Tribunal determines the amount awarded to the rights-holder for copyright infringement arising from file-sharing. The maximum penalty is $15,000

Pitting the finest bottles from France against the best of the New World has been a popular and controversial thing to do since 1976, when California wines defeated the best of Bordeaux and Burgundy.

In these taste-offs, the wines are tasted blind, meaning judges review them without knowing the identity of samples in each glass. Scores are collated to give each wine an overall ranking and winners are announced. Now those taste-offs against the New World have come to Hong Kong, which tends to favor French wines above all else.

At a recent Bordeaux vs. New Zealand tasting, for instance, a 275 Hong Kong dollar (US$35) New Zealand bottle came in third place, ahead of Château Lafite-Rothschild (HK$14,500), Château Latour (HK$9,400), and Château Margaux (HK$6,250). It failed to best Château Mouton-Rothschild (HK$8,000) and Château Haut-Brion (HK$6,000), which took first and second place, respectively.

This kind of blind taste test “takes away all your preconceptions and you are just focusing on quality and possibly personal preferences,” said Lisa Perrotti-Brown, a Singapore-based Master of Wine who emceed the event.

The New Zealand wines included in the taste contest were made from the same red-grape variety used to make Bordeaux and came from vines in Gimblett Gravels, an 800-hectare grape-growing region that is part of Hawkes Bay on the east side of the North Island. The first vine was grown just 30 years ago on the gravelly soils that have a unique terroir because of the region’s summer and autumn heat.

The New Zealand wines ranged in price between HK$225 and HK$550 a bottle; the third-place bottle was the Mission Estate Jewelstone Cabernet Merlot, which produces just 800 cases a year. That’s far below 25,000 cases produced by Château Mouton-Rothschild, which won top marks at the tasting.

These events “allow us to strut our stuff better,” said Mr. Easthope of Craggy Range. But “at the end of the day it’s a bit of fun.”

New Members

 

We would like to welcome the following new member to the Chamber : 

 

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