Give more support to exporters

Jan 13 2010 by Sue Scott, Evening Gazette

LOCAL business leaders are urging a major expansion of the export guarantee scheme, introduced last year to stimulate economic recovery.

Yesterday, new trade figures showed the UK’s trade deficit stood at £6.8bn for November - slightly better than expected, but still only representing a 0.1% month-on-month increase in goods sold overseas.

Jonathan Walker, policy adviser for international trade at the North East Chamber of Commerce, which is running its own Go Global export campaign, said the government was still not doing enough to give exporters the confidence they needed to get back into world markets. He called for a fully state-backed guarantee scheme to run for as long as was needed.

“A lot of the progress that was made in the last two years (in the region) has been wiped out. We are back to where we were,” he said.

The North-east - historically one of the smallest export regions - had ratcheted up its performance, becoming the fastest growing in the UK in 2008.

Companies which continued to look overseas last year for growth had fared better, mostly because they were selling into more diverse markets than their competitors in countries that had seen swifter recovery, said Mr Walker.

“We hear from a lot of local exporters that they have been shielded from the worst of the recession - particularly those with a diverse range of customers. They are also well placed to capitalise on the growth that’s already started to emerge in countries including China, Brazil and India.”

He said the export guarantee scheme - which rescued a £9m deal for Boulby firm Cleveland Potash when it faced losing a Brazilian contract last year due to withdrawal of trade insurance - should be there “to help those businesses that would otherwise not get into exporting, not just those in trouble”.