Noting the “serious headwinds” the global trade system faces with US President Donald Trump’s plan for widespread tariffs, New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon called on Monday for Indo-Pacific nations to deepen their economic integration through free trade and strengthened supply chains.
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“Geopolitical calculations are being totally upended,” Luxon said in New Delhi, adding that the world was shifting from globalisation to hypernationalism and from “openness to xenophobia”.
The Trump administration’s US trade agenda for 2025 focuses on “unfair and unbalanced” trade practices and bilateral trade deficits. Trump has also announced reciprocal tariffs against all trading partners starting April 2.
With such potentially destabilising issues to confront, the Indo-Pacific economic interdependence that served as an engine for growth, Luxon said, “can no longer be assumed in an age when decoupling, onshoring, protectionism and trade wars are displacing best-price open markets and integrated supply chains”.
“Previously, we could count on countries respecting the UN Charter, the Law of the Sea and world trade rules that, sadly, cannot be assumed in an age of sharp competition,” he contended, warning that this could lead to “dangerous miscalculations”.
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Should China be concerned about the latest Japan-Philippines security pact?
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But Luxon did hail Indo-Pacific regional trade alliances as critical tools to navigating the instability to come.