New Zealand and ASEAN: The Business of Building Relationships

That was clear at Tuesday's ASEAN Business Forum at Auckland's Northern Club, organised by the ASEAN Business Council, where ministers, entrepreneurs and business leaders returned to a broader question: how does New Zealand build deeper, more meaningful economic ties with a region that is becoming increasingly important to its future?

The answer was not just about tariffs, investment or trade figures. It was about the people, relationships and networks that make those economic connections possible.

Trade relationships are often discussed through the lens of statistics and market access. Yet the reality on the ground is far more human. It is a New Zealand business owner searching for a trusted partner in an unfamiliar market, or an entrepreneur in Southeast Asia deciding whether a new relationship is worth the risk. Success is rarely built on agreements alone; it depends on trust, local knowledge and relationships that take time to develop. Throughout the Forum, speakers returned repeatedly to this point, highlighting the gap between the economic narrative and the realities of doing business across ASEAN.

New Zealand Trade Minister Todd McClay highlighted the growing importance of the ASEAN region to New Zealand’s prosperity. Photo: Carla Teng-Westergaard/AMC.

A Relationship Built Over Five Decades

Opening the Forum, Trade Minister Todd McClay pointed to a relationship that has been five decades in the making. What began with diplomatic engagement has evolved into a substantial economic partnership, anchored by New Zealand’s Free Trade Agreements with ASEAN and formalised further through the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.

Today, two-way trade between New Zealand and the ASEAN bloc sits at approximately NZ$30 billion. But that figure represents more than goods moving across borders. Behind it are decades of institution-building, negotiation and trust, much of which happens quietly, and is rarely visible to the people whose daily lives and businesses depend on it.

That history matters, particularly because of where the relationship is heading. Speakers throughout the day pointed to the same strategic reality: at a time when global trade is becoming less predictable, ASEAN stands out as the fastest-growing economic region in the world. For a small, trade-dependent economy like New Zealand, sitting a long way from most of its major markets, the region’s combination of size, growth and geographic proximity makes its importance difficult to overstate.

It is the kind of fact that sounds obvious once someone says it out loud, but is easy to lose sight of when trade is discussed mainly in terms of agreements, markets and figures.

Beyond the Numbers: The Human Element

The morning’s remarks established the scale of the opportunity. The panels that followed began to explore something more difficult: what does it actually take to build a successful relationship across the region?

Ariestelo “Telo” Asilo, Founder and CEO of Varacco, a coffee social enterprise in the Philippines built around the farmers at its centre, offered one of the Forum’s clearest reminders that Southeast Asia cannot be approached as a single, uniform market. Each country has its own culture, language and local context. Treating the region as one bloc, as it is sometimes shorthanded in trade strategy documents, risks overlooking the very things that make those markets work.

For Asilo, that means the relationship has to be more than transactional. He put it plainly: “We shouldn’t lose the heart of it, because that’s the people,” he said. “If we’re only being transactional, then all we’re talking about is tariffs and trade, and we lose the people, who are what matters most.”

It is a simple point, but one that is easy to nod along to in a conference room and much harder to live out when a business is under pressure to hit a quarterly target.

Asilo also pointed to something New Zealand and the Philippines already share, a capacity to build from what they have. “We are both countries with people who know how to build from what they have,” he said. “So I hope that my time here is not simply about what I can bring home from New Zealand. I hope it is also about what we can create together.”

That final word, together, is important. It shifts the relationship away from the language of a one-way export deal and towards something more reciprocal.

Ariestelo Asilo, CEO of Varacco from the Philippines, reflects on his journey from selling coffee to building connections, partnerships and opportunities between communities and countries. Photo: Carla Teng-Westergaard/AMC.

The same idea surfaced in a different form in the remarks of Kate Bezar, director at Better Packaging Co., a company working to shrink environmental footprints and create positive impact through packaging design. Its product, POLLAST!C, is a range of mailing sachets and poly garment bags made from certified recycled Ocean Bound Plastic, collected by a network of individuals in coastal communities across Southeast Asia.

Over five years, that network has cleared close to three million kilograms of waste. It is a striking figure, but Kate’s contribution was less about the number than the question behind it.

When doing business in ASEAN, are we actually helping the people we work with?

It is not a question asked at every trade event. But it gets to the heart of what Asilo was also describing: whether economic relationships can deliver value on both sides, rather than simply measuring success by what New Zealand can sell into the region.

Between their contributions, a broader picture began to emerge. Doing business with ASEAN is not simply about identifying what the region can buy from New Zealand. It is about understanding what can be built together, for New Zealand businesses and for Southeast Asian communities alike.

Market Entry: Finding the Right Partners

That idea of building together quickly led to a more practical question: once the good intentions are in place, how do New Zealand businesses actually break into ASEAN markets?

Several New Zealand entrepreneurs shared their experiences of what it took to succeed in the region, with speakers from BECA, Griffins, CreativeHQ and Nagi Tahu Seafood weighing in. The session stood out for its candour, with speakers engaging in more open and honest conversations about the realities of doing business.

Moderating the discussion, Tim McCready, Director for Business and Entrepreneurship of the Asia New Zealand Foundation, put a deceptively simple question to the panel: how do you find the right local partners, and what does a “good partner” actually look like?

It sounds like a question with an easy answer. It isn’t.

(L-R): Aaron Endacott of Ngai Tahu Seafood, Brett Holland of CreativeHQ, Julie Baillie of Griffins, Nick Edwards of Beca, and Tim McCready of Asia New Zealand Foundation. Photo: Carla Teng-Westergaard/AMC.

The panel converged on the importance of New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE) in helping businesses identify and connect with the right people on the ground. The ideal partner, they agreed, combines strong knowledge of the local market with an understanding of New Zealand’s own market and culture, someone who can effectively translate between the two.

Brett Holland of CreativeHQ added a more candid note, cautioning against underestimating the role that "plain luck" had played at points in its own start-up journey. It is not the sort of admission that usually makes it into a trade strategy document, but it is probably true of most business success stories if people are being honest about it.

Aaron Endacott of Ngai Tahu Seafood on the panel brought the conversation back to something even more fundamental: how you show up.

“ You need the willingness to learn, their culture, their market. That’s where trust builds, and that’s what starts opening doors,” he said. “Respect people, take the time to understand their ways, and be consistent, and if you say you’ll do it, do it. Those values matter.”

The advice is straightforward. But, as the discussion at the Forum made clear, putting it into practice can be more challenging. Building trust may be a clear priority, but maintaining it when negotiations become more demanding requires sustained effort.

Trust also takes on greater importance as the wider trading environment becomes less certain.

Mitchell Pham spoke about the value of deepening ties with partners such as ASEAN as global conditions become more unpredictable.

“The more volatile the world is, the more important it is to have trusted partners in our region,” he said.

He also highlighted the importance of diversification, with New Zealand continuing to build trade relationships across the region rather than relying heavily on any single market.

For New Zealand, ASEAN provides an important avenue for both trade diversification and closer regional connections.

Mitchelle Pham emphasised that, in an unpredictable world, businesses will increasingly distinguish between partnerships that are truly built to last and those that remain shallow — making deep, trusted relationships more important than ever. Photo: Carla Teng-Westergaard/AMC.

Road to 2030

The next phase of the relationship is now set out in a formal roadmap.

New Zealand has developed a Plan of Action through to 2030, outlining priorities for deepening its engagement with ASEAN. The plan follows the elevation of the relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP), marking the latest step in a relationship that began with the establishment of diplomatic ties five decades ago.

Much of the formal architecture is now in place. The next test is how that framework translates into activity on the ground, more businesses trading across borders, more investment, stronger networks, and deeper connections between New Zealand and ASEAN.

The business forum on Tuesday brought that next phase into focus. Governments can set the framework, but the relationship is built through people, through the businesses that find each other, the entrepreneurs who exchange ideas, the partnerships that take shape across borders, and the communities that turn those connections into something tangible.

-Asia Media Centre