Exporting to the United Kingdom

Australia’s connection with the United Kingdom goes back longer than any other market, and our exports are thriving there. Cameron Bayley investigates the appeal, and the challenges, of the UK market.

It’s not just Australia’s soap operas and pop stars making it big in the UK, plenty in other fields are flying the flag for ‘brand Australia’. In 2006, it was our fifth largest export market, behind Japan, China, the US, and Korea (by a whisker), and contributed around 6 percent to the nation’s export coffers.

With successes springing up in a wide range of industries, Alison McGuigan-Lewis, departing senior trade commissioner for Austrade in the UK, admits it’s sometimes hard to know where to focus Austrade’s attention. It’s a problem, but one they don’t mind dealing with. "There are great growth opportunities almost anywhere you look within the market. So it’s been a very positive story in the bilateral relationship, particularly commercially," McGuigan-Lewis says, citing current figures that show goods exports worth around $8 billion, and services at $4.5 billion.

Looking at services alone the UK market moves further up the rankings, coming in around third place. One of the reasons for this, says McGuigan-Lewis, is that goods such as IT software and programs are often bundled with associated services, rather than packaged off the shelf. According to statistics from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), some of Australia’s other successful service industries to the UK include those related to travel, finance, and business. Large Australian companies such as QBE, Macquarie Bank, and IAG are having enormous success in the finance and insurance market. Smaller sized exporters are finding the ICT and related software skills and services industries is the sector where they can kick some goals, says Jamie Banks, director of investment for UK Trade and Investment, the British government department which facilitates international trade between Australia and the UK (and the other way around). "That’s where the opportunities and the strengths lie."

In terms of goods exported, non-monetary gold is the country’s top export to the UK. Next is alcoholic beverages. Until recently the UK was Australia’s top export market for wine. Although the US has pipped us to first place in terms of value of exports, it remains our largest in terms of volume. Minerals and metals such as coal, lead, iron ore and copper are also big sellers, with manufactured goods such as aircraft and parts, medicinal and pharmaceutical products, computer parts, and motor vehicle parts also faring well, just outside the top 10.

So, what is it about the UK that makes it so appealing to Aussie exporters? "We’re clearly very fortunate in the fact that there’s common heritage, shared language, same legal systems," says Banks. He adds that family connections and the sheer number of Australians who take advantage of working holiday visas in the UK adds to a huge fondness for the country and a vast array of networking links that can help business. McGuigan-Lewis agrees: "Business is all about people. If you think of the number of visitors and émigrés out to Australia, there are lots of people-to-people connections." Austrade estimates there are 300,000 Australians living and working in the UK at any one time, and McGuigan-Lewis says many Australians hold senior positions in British businesses.

Peter Stone, managing director of NeoProducts, who export touchscreen self-service kiosks to the UK, says it was the familiarity and shared elements between the two countries, as well as the size of the market, that attracted the company to the UK for export. "You’re walking into a country that’s got similar values, similar cultures, same language, and all of a sudden you’ve got three times the size of the puddle you’re playing in."