Advertise on podcast: New Zealand China Council Podcast

The Schwarzman Scholars Programme offers an unparalleled chance to study global affairs for a year at Tsinghua University in Beijing, taught by and studying alongside some of the world’s best and brightest. Yet few New Zealanders have participated. Jamie Wood is one who has. In this podcast Jamie talks about her experiences, and the windows into China and the world opened through the programme; as well as her next career move, with an AI and robotics-focused Chinese investment fund.

What does it take to build a food brand in one of the world’s fastest-changing markets? What food trends are shaping Chinese consumer choices in 2025? How are consumers responding to sustainability when it comes to food? And do Kiwi exporters need to keep up with “China speed”? In this episode, Kiwi entrepreneur Christiana Zhu 朱佳慧 talks to the Council’s Summer Xia about her journey as Founder-CEO of Marvelous Foods—the company behind Yeyo, China’s first dairy-free coconut yogurt—along with insights from her other diverse experiences in and with China. Whether you’re curious about the China market, passionate about sustainability, or love a good founder story, this episode is packed with insights worth exploring.

Are China’s annual ‘Two Sessions’ (known in Chinese as ‘lianghui’) in early March the world’s largest political meetings you didn’t hear about? We’re back again for a discussion of these critical political meetings in 2025, hosting our returning contributor Associate Professor Jason Young, Director of the Contemporary China Research Centre at Victoria University of Wellington, talking with our Council’s Executive Director Alistair Crozier (For those new to the 'lianghui’ you can also check out our previous video explainer on our 'INSIGHT' page for a quick introduction.) As Beijing outlines its priorities for socio-economic growth, innovation, green development, foreign policy and much more, these meetings hold important clues for New Zealand's relationship with our largest trading partner.

In February 2025, we launched our latest research report: Te hono a te ao Māori ki a Haina: Māori approaches to engagement with China past, present, future. Hear from the report authors and other rangatira involved in the relationship, to understand this unique partnership and the future opportunities and prosperity it offers.

This September in Aotearoa New Zealand, we celebrate two special weeks: Te Wiki o te Reo Māori (14–21 Sept), marking the 52nd anniversary of the Māori Language Petition on Saturday 14th, and New Zealand Chinese Language Week (22–28 Sept). Both initiatives promote language learning in New Zealand by raising awareness, sharing cultural stories, and connecting communities. Languages bridge cultures, fostering understanding and appreciation. With this inspiration in mind, our latest podcast features @EThan Jones, @Laura Oh, and @Luke Qin, who join our Council’s Assistant Director @Summer Xia to discuss their journeys of learning Te Reo Māori and Chinese languages, exploring linguistic and cultural connections and sharing some fun stories along the way (some were very surprising).

Like New Zealand, Australia is also tracking China’s economy closely, as well as grappling with increasingly complex regional geopolitics. It’s always helpful for us to swap notes, especially with an acknowledged Australia-China expert. Professor James Laurenceson is Director of the Australia China Research Institute (ACRI), Australia’s first and only research centre focused exclusively on the bilateral relationship. In this podcast he and New Zealand China Council Executive Director Alistair Crozier explore a range of current China-related issues that are important on both sides of the Tasman, given their implications for our prosperity and security.

China is New Zealand’s largest source of imports, whether ready for consumption under NZ or increasingly well-known Chinese brands, or providing materials and components for our domestic manufacturing outputs. Does this leave us exposed - are there particular products from China we can’t do without, and what would happen if supply was interrupted? Should New Zealand be looking at diversification strategies? And what are the exciting new opportunities that Chinese imports offer to our economy? In June 2024, we commissioned Sense Partners to research the scale and profile of New Zealand’s imports from China. This podcast is a recording of the report launch webinar on 26 June. Tune in to listen to the report author’s summary of key findings and an industry experts’ discussion, co-hosted with the North Asia Centre of Asia-Pacific Excellence.

Every March, the ‘lianghui’ or ‘Two Sessions’ political meetings in Beijing set the scene and key directions for China’s year ahead: its intended socio-economic goals and strategies, priority sectors, key personnel appointments and foreign policy settings. These are valuable signposts for New Zealanders following latest developments in China. In this podcast, Director of the Contemporary China Research Centre at Victoria University of Wellington Associate Professor Jason Young returns to distil the essential highlights of the 2024 ‘lianghui’ in discussion with our Executive Director Alistair Crozier.

‘How to feed 1.4 billion people’ is already a big question. And how to do it sustainably? Answers to these questions are not only crucial for people in China, but also important for New Zealand. China is our largest trade partner: Understanding its future sustainable food policy directions, and how this will affect China’s food consumption, production and investment, is essential. In late 2023 we commissioned Trivium China to prepare a research report on China’s policy and regulatory approaches to sustainable food, with a focus on protein. This podcast is a recording of the report launch webinar on 4 December, including the report author’s summary of key findings and an industry experts discussion, co-hosted with the North Asia Centre of Asia-Pacific Excellence.

The New Zealand Business Roundtable in China (NZBRiC), a representative body for New Zealand companies doing business in and with China, recently completed a groundbreaking survey of over 50 kiwi businesses to provide a first-hand, on-the-ground perspective of the real business environment and mood for New Zealand companies operating there in 2023. In this podcast we explore the main strategies, challenges and perspectives revealed in the survey, hot off the press, with NZBRiC’s Executive Director Anna-May Isbey and Executive Member James Robertson (Fonterra).

Collaborative Horizons report launch Webinar by New Zealand China Council Podcast

How do New Zealanders assess China’s response to climate change? We recently had a unique opportunity to work with InstatData, a kiwi start-up which analyses social media posts to gauge New Zealanders’ opinions on particular issues. We put their technology to the test to focus on China and climate change, as an issue we suspected would reveal diverse public perceptions. And then we discussed the findings with New Zealander Emilly Fan, who is currently researching in this area in Beijing. Are New Zealanders’ impressions about China and climate change justified? How do younger Chinese feel about the issues? And what more could New Zealand and China do together to tackle this critical global challenge?

This podcast is a recording of the webinar launching our report “Resuming Normal Service? Assessing future prospects for New Zealand-China services trade”, jointly held with the North Asia Centre of Asia-Pacific Excellence. It includes an exclusive briefing by the report author and a discussion featuring services trade experts, moderated by the Executive Director of the New Zealand China Council. The questions discussed include: Will trade in established services sectors again be an important part of overall bilateral trade with scope for future recovery and expansion? Are there new sectors that so far remain under-explored? What are the barriers and challenges that will need to be overcome for services sectors to reach their full potential?

The 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China took place recently in Beijing. The pivotal five-yearly event in China’s political calendar drew global interest. But beyond the media headlines, what were the key outcomes of the Congress and how could these affect China’s policy directions and New Zealand’s future engagement with China? In this podcast, Jason Young, Associate Professor in the School of History, Philosophy, Political Science and International Relations at the Victoria University of Wellington, discusses these issues with our Council’s Executive Director Alistair Crozier.

This week is New Zealand Chinese Language Week. We sat down with our Council members Kiri Nathan, founder of her eponymous clothing brand Kiri Nathan Limited, and Mark Tanner, Founder and Managing Director of Shanghai based market strategy and research agency China Skinny, to explore their own Chinese language journeys. In this podcast you will hear how two New Zealanders have tackled learning and using their Chinese language. Kiri also shares how she has gained more understanding and respect of different cultures through learning Te Reo Māori and Chinese.