More freight and business activity will continue once New Zealand moves to alert level 3 on April 27 but the delay and lack of clarity is “disappointing”, the Road Transport Forum (RTF) says.
RTF chief executive Nick Leggett says he is “disappointed businesses have to wait another week to get going”.
“There is also not much clarity on the level 3 process for business planning, as the announcement only refers to a two week period before review by Cabinet on 11 May.
“What happens then? Business preparation is important, particularly around receipt of goods for businesses to be able to open and managing staff numbers.
“Like many businesses, particularly the small and medium sized businesses, road freight transport has suffered under the alert level 4 lockdown. Some of those businesses may not recover, and unfortunately, that will mean hardship for the business owners and the workers they will have to let go.
“The longer the lockdown, the more businesses that will fold and the more people that will be left unemployed.
“While there are still considerable restrictions under level 3, and we urge all road freight transport operators to be mindful of those, this change means forestry, wood processors, construction, manufacturers, contactless retail and home removal companies can mostly get back to work, which will mean a lot of freight moving.
“Unfortunately, forestry, wood processing and manufacturing have all suffered from not being able to export their goods, with other countries, where there were not such restrictions, swooping in and taking their markets.
“Hopefully those industries can get back up and running quickly, and continue to prove the superiority of New Zealand products in our export markets. We are going to need healthy exports across the board to help our economy recover.
“The lockdown experience has shown how absolutely essential road freight transport is. It has also shown how complex the logistics of moving freight around New Zealand and the world are. Disrupting just one link in the chain can have massive flow on effects and lots of negative unintended consequences. For this reason, we believe no matter what the emergency situation is, road freight transport should be allowed to get through.
“Operating in the COVID-19 world requires some significant changes to the way businesses operate, and for that reason, we have issued guidance, including protocols, for road freight transport businesses to operate under level 3 and beyond.”
*Guidance and protocols specific to the road freight transport industry are available here.
Of course this thing is disappointing, the whole friggin thing is disappointing. But it’s a pandemic, a virus like the world has not seen in any of our lifetimes. Every single person in the whole chain is learning because there is no reference for anyone.
I’m not particularly a fan of our current government, but I will tell you what, I take my hat off to them because throughout this whole saga they have done an outstanding job. This country has the most impressive Covid results in the world. Why, because of the actions taken by this government and by 5m New Zealanders to get on top of it.
Of course I too am upset, my business has lost hundreds of thousands of dollars as a result of the stand-down, that’s money out of my pocket ultimately, but it is what it is and there is no point in me whinging about it. I have to get back on my feet, be positive and push on from here. And I am struggling with this, my management team are struggling to get to grips with everything we must do in the time we have, but we aren’t complaining, we are marching ahead, doing what we must, because that is the only way we are going to make headway.
We are grateful that we live in New Zealand and have only had to withstand 4.5 weeks of lockdown, rather than many other places in the world which have not been so well managed and have to put up with much more.
If I might be so bold as to offer a suggestion, get out of whinging mode and be positive, help your body and your members recover from this by finding positive steps and add to the equation positively and lift them up instead of pulling everyone’s efforts down. I would suggest that your responsibility is to lead from the front, not the rear.