in good stead in projecting a professional,
internationally-orientated image to potential investors from other parts of the world.]
You have much to offer, and in partnership with government and with organisations such as the West Midlands Development Agency you are well-placed to reap some of the fruits of Asian companies' interest in the UK as an investment location.
Export opportunities
Let me turn now to an area close to many of your hearts-export opportunities. Many of you will have experience in trading with Europe or the US. Some of you, I know, have also ventured further afield and have already made successful forays into the Asia Pacific area. Mr Cass tells me that 10% of all the SDA's manufacturing member firms, and 30% of all exporting firms, have customers in the Far East an impressive total. I am sure those
of you who have taken the plunge into the Pacific will join me in confirming that these are markets that demand determination and vision, but that more than repay the effort put in.
I know that a number of other potential export markets are competing for your attention at present. The collapse of communism has opened up new worlds of opportunity in Eastern Europe; the creation of the Single Market has perhaps encouraged you to consider intensifying your efforts in the EC. Some countries in Latin America, notably Brazil and Argentina, are set to become formidable industrial presences. I would not wish you to turn your backs on any of these openings. But I do urge you to take a serious look too at the Asia-Pacific market.
As we have already seen, the Asia Pacific is the fastest growing region in the world. Its populations, on the whole, are growing, young and increasingly affluent. Most countries can boast sound and proven industrial and financial bases.
They have increasingly open political systems, yet government continues to provide a steady guiding hand. There are high growth markets in virtually every sector - high technology; equipment and materials to assist in the process of industrialisation; water, transport, power and other infrastructure; financial and other services; consumer goods to satisfy growing spending power.
Your Chairman and his colleagues in the ceramics industry could, I am sure, tell you all about the appetite of the upwardly mobile Japanese public for high quality china and ornaments.
I am convinced that British trade with the Asia Pacific is at least as important as trade with either North America or Europe in terms of our survival as a competitive international economy. How can government help you to make the most of the opportunities?
gladspeech1301
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