In Autumn Statement 2022, the Chancellor announced a fund of up to £2 million for the then Department for International Trade, now the Department for Business and Trade, to: “work with local partners including Invest Northern Ireland to host a trade and investment event in Northern Ireland in 2023.”

The Department is working closely with partners at pace to define the event and will deliver the event in collaboration with Invest Northern Ireland. We will shortly engage a range of businesses and organisations across Northern Ireland.

In Autumn Statement 2022, the Chancellor announced a fund of up to £2 million for the then Department for International Trade, now the Department for Business and Trade, to: “work with local partners including Invest Northern Ireland to host a trade and investment event in Northern Ireland in 2023.”

The Department is working closely with partners at pace to define the event and will deliver the event in collaboration with Invest Northern Ireland. We will shortly engage a range of businesses and organisations across Northern Ireland.

In Autumn Statement 2022, the Chancellor announced a fund of up to £2 million for the then Department for International Trade, now the Department for Business and Trade, to: “work with local partners including Invest Northern Ireland to host a trade and investment event in Northern Ireland in 2023.”

The Department is working closely with partners at pace to define the event and will deliver the event in collaboration with Invest Northern Ireland. We will shortly engage a range of businesses and organisations across Northern Ireland.

Prime Minister’s Trade Envoys are appointed to a wide spectrum of countries where they are able to make a significant contribution to the government’s trade and investment objectives and the ultimate decision is the Prime Minister’s. The government tailors our business and investor support in different countries depending on market conditions and opportunities. We are regularly reviewing countries and markets to identify where the appointment of a Trade Envoy can be of greatest benefit.

Prime Minister’s Trade Envoys are appointed to a wide spectrum of countries where they are able to make a significant contribution to the Government’s trade and investment objectives.

They champion Global Britain and promote the UK as a destination of choice for inward investment across all regions of the UK, helping to level up the country by supplementing the UK’s existing trade relations in their respective markets, working with our regional Trade Commissioners and global network to promote British business across the globe.

The Department for International Trade, now known as the Department for Business and Trade, works to support UK businesses in their trading endeavors in the Dominican Republic and Colombia.

This includes promotional activity in the UK, such as the upcoming LATAC Roadshow where our experts will showcase opportunities in these markets for UK businesses. Additionally, my noble Friend Baroness Hooper and my Hon. Friend for Fylde are active Trade Envoys for these countries, engaging with businesses in the UK and abroad.

Following recent Ministerial visits, the Government has hosted a senior Colombian rail delegation to promote UK expertise in this sector and is pursuing an ambitious multi-billion pound pipeline of infrastructure projects in the Dominican Republic.

Trade Envoys are Parliamentarians appointed by the Prime Minister to support the Government’s trade and investment agenda in one or more specific markets. They report to my Rt Hon. Friend the Secretary of State and are ultimately accountable to the Prime Minister.

HM Trade Commissioners are senior Civil Servants recruited under fair and open competition and appointed to head the overseas operations for this department. They are accountable to the Permanent Secretary and ultimately to the Secretary of State.

The Department for International Trade, now known as the Department for Business and Trade, is responsible for the day-to-day management of the programme and each Trade Envoy has a Civil Servant relationship manager. Relationship managers act as the Trade Envoy’s point of contact, coordinating their activity and provide administrative support when they undertake overseas visits, by arranging flights, visas, a programme of activity and briefing.

The Trade Envoy role is unpaid, but this department meets the costs of any travel expenditure such as transport and accommodation to allow them to carry out their role.

Trade Envoys are appointed by the Prime Minister to support the Government’s trade and investment objectives. Trade Envoys add value in their respective markets, through the soft power influence they bring in developing relationships with key influencers and feedback has been very positive. Trade Envoys are one part of the Department’s support for British businesses seeking to export and win contracts overseas and we do not separate out the impact of Trade Envoys from our broader departmental work.

UK trade has been affected by several shocks in recent years, including the Covid Pandemic, exiting the EU and war in Ukraine. In the period since leaving the EU, the value of UK exports to the EU is back to pre-Covid levels. Latest figures published by the Office for National Statistics show that the UK total exports of goods and services to the EU were worth £330.2bn in the 12 months to September 2022. This represents an overall increase of 10% in current prices compared to pre-Covid levels in 2018, with services exports growing by 12% in current prices in this period.

The Department makes use of customs data to monitor and better understand patterns of demand for imports and exports of goods and is continuously looking at ways improve and integrate complex datasets and techniques further.

The Department also uses customs data from HMRC and UN COMTRADE to analyse trade flows in the context of supply chains. This is done to improve the visibility of UK critical supply chains and inform government resilience strategies. The Department also leads a cross-Government project called the ‘Global Supply Chains Intelligence Pilot’ which aims to combine government and commercial datasets, along with big data analytics, to map global supply chains.

On 12-13 December 2022 the Secretary of State for International Trade visited India to meet the Minister for Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal, and to initiate the sixth round of the UK-India Free Trade Agreement negotiations. A written ministerial statement on the latest negotiation round can be found here.

The Government has committed to additional measures for new free trade agreements which go beyond our statutory scrutiny requirements.

The Australia and New Zealand agreements were made available for scrutiny for an additional six months before commencement of the statutory period under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 (CRaG). We have made additional reporting commitments to support scrutiny, including publishing the advice of the independent Trade and Agriculture Commission.

The Trade (Australian and New Zealand) Bill is currently being scrutinised by Parliament. The agreements cannot be brought into force until the legislation has been passed by Parliament.

The Department’s impact assessments of the UK-Australia and UK-New Zealand Free Trade Agreements were published on 17^th December 2021 and 28^th February 2022 respectively.

The full impact assessments are available on gov.uk.

Farming is a crucial part of the UK economy, and this Government wants to ensure rural economies can thrive. Our free trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand balance opportunities for UK exporters, importers and consumers with protections for the agricultural industry.

British agri-food exporters will benefit from both deals removing tariffs for all UK goods. We offer a range of support for those looking to increase their exports, including the Export Support Service, the digital GREAT.gov.uk platform and our new Food and Drink Export Council.

In January 2021, the Government implemented measures to ensure UK traders could move steel products captured by the EU’s steel safeguard quota, tariff-free, to Northern Ireland while the quota was open. Since July 2022, the quota for certain steel product categories has been filling up rapidly due to changes to the quota allocation by the EU. Where a tariff is due, traders may be able to use the Customs Duty Waiver Scheme.

The Government continues to engage with the EU to find a solution to ensure that trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland can take place without undue disruption.