Opinion
Boycotters on the back foot as UK-Israel trade blossoms
Consultation is now open over a new formal trade agreement
February 8, 2022 11:22
2 min read
Consultation is now open over a new formal trade agreement
February 8, 2022 11:22Last week’s visit to Israel by International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan showed how campaigns in the UK to isolate the country are failing.
The anti-Israel obsessives were working overtime with last week’s report from Amnesty International, but her visit showed the relationship between the UK and Israel has never been stronger.
Hundreds of businesses and thousands of jobs in the UK already rely on trade between Britain and Israel. The UK is Israel’s third largest trading partner, with £2.7 billion worth of British exports in 2020 and an overall trade relationship worth £4.8 billion. Despite the pandemic Israeli investment in the UK was worth over £200m last year.
The current trade arrangements date back to the 1980s, pre-dating the explosion of the UK’s service sector and long before the internet and digital economy revolution transformed every area of our lives. As a result, services account for 70% of both country’s economies but only 35% of bilateral trade, so opening up sectors like services, tech, life sciences, AI and cyber security could create huge numbers of good, well-paid jobs in the UK.
At the same time, UK exporters should benefit from lower tariffs and better access to markets in areas like education, healthcare, and food and drink.
Ms Trevelyan was in Israel to launch the formal consultation for a new UK-Israel trade agreement and to announce plans for a major Innovation Summit later in the spring.
But in addition to a busy schedule of talks with government ministers, visits to businesses and universities and meetings with entrepreneurs and investors, she took time to tour the Old City, see the Western Wall and, just a few days after Holocaust Memorial Day, pay the UK’s respects to the victims of history’s greatest crime by laying a wreath at Yad Vashem.
In trade terms, the visit was a huge success. Months of work by the UK’s brilliant ambassador, Neil Wigan, trade director Matthew Salter and their officials paid off as ministers on both sides got down to business.
She kicked off the formal discussions by meeting the Israeli Minister for Innovation Science and Technology Orit Farkash-HaCohen and Economy Minister Orna Barbivai.
With a background in business and accountancy, the Secretary of State has huge authority on the details of the relationship between the two countries and the complexities of the negotiations, but it was her personal warmth, good humour and charm that enabled her to hit it off with her Israeli counterparts.
The formal government meetings were followed by a visit to Hebrew University’s Rehovot campus where she saw the latest developments in agri-tech. Representing a rural, farming constituency, she was in her element, excitedly discussing the latest developments in growing barley. As a former International Development Secretary, she was fascinated to discuss technologies that will enable communities hit by draught to grow stronger and more resilient crops.
That evening and the following morning at roundtables hosted by the ambassador she talked to tech entrepreneurs about the how the UK can benefit from closer trading ties with Israel, and listened to some of Israel’s biggest investors explain how, with her help, they can increase investment in the UK in future.
Before traveling to Ramallah for talks with the Palestinian Authority, she visited Tel Aviv’s new metro system which will not only transform travel around the city but provide opportunities for UK infrastructure and transport firms too.
The eight-week consultation is now open. The International Trade Department wants to hear how tariffs and barriers to trade can be reduced, business in services can be boosted and the relationship between the UK and Israel strengthened. Anyone who wants to take part can do so here.
The next steps will be a UK-Israel Innovation Summit in London later this spring with both prime ministers bringing together entrepreneurs, investors and leading businesses.
Thanks to Anne-Marie Trevelyan and her Israeli counterparts, a week which started with an Amnesty International report designed to isolate Israel ended with the two countries closer together than ever before.
Lord Austin is trade envoy to Israel
