Foreword

This OECD Trade and Gender Review sheds light on the impacts of trade and trade policies on New Zealand women as workers, consumers, and business owners and leaders. This review is informed by New Zealand’s Trade for All Agenda and draws on the OECD’s Trade and Gender Framework of Analysis. It sets out a number of policy recommendations to ensure New Zealand women share in the benefits from trade.

This Review is a joint project between the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) and the Trade and Agriculture Directorate (TAD) of the OECD. The research and analysis undertaken by OECD employed and adapted in-house tools such as the Services Trade Restrictiveness Index (STRI), the Trade Facilitation Indicators (TFI), and the METRO trade model. The Review benefitted from recently developed gender-disaggregated trade data from New Zealand’s administrative and other datasets by the Economic Division of MFAT. Quantitative findings were complemented by qualitative input gathered during a series of workshops and interviews with women entrepreneurs and exporters. Recommendations on policy settings were developed by the OECD in consultation with officials from a range of New Zealand government agencies.

The evidence and policy recommendations presented in this Review aim to inform future actions by New Zealand to improve women’s participation in trade. It is also hoped that this Review can serve as a template for similar trade and gender reviews of other countries.