Shadow Treasurer Rob Lucas said today that the latest export figures show that SA’s export performance is the worst of all the states.
The most recent export figures released by the ABS show that export growth in some states is almost 5 times stronger than SA’s export growth and Australian figures are almost 3 times stronger than SA’s growth figures.
The ABS figures from March 2005 show:
State % Increase in Exports (Year ending March 2005 compared with year ending March 2004)
Qld 25.2
NSW 24.2
Aust 14.7
WA 13.2
Tas 10.2
Vic 9.4
SA 5.7
The ABS figures also show that the total value of exports in the last year was only $7.81b down significantly from the record figure of $9b achieved during the last year of the Liberal Government. It should be noted that Premier Rann has stated he is going to treble the value of exports from the original $9b figure by 2013!
It is now clear the Rann Government has to rethink completely its trade and development policies. It is impossible to understand why the Rann Government is closing down so many of its trade offices – Japan, United States, Malaysia, Indonesia and Hong Kong have all been closed with a downgraded presence being retained in Hong Kong.
At the same time the Rann Government has ‘gutted’ the states key trade development agency (Department for Trade and Economic Development) by virtually halving the number of staff employed in the agency.