Tribute to a New Zealand-China trade pioneer

The last surviving foreigner to attend China’s Canton Trade Fair when it began in 1957 has died. But Victor Percival will always be remembered more for his lifetime contribution to the New Zealand-China relationship.

When he attended the NZ-China Free Trade Agreement signing in Beijing as a guest of the New Zealand government in 2008, he told Listener journalist Rebecca MacFie that he felt a great sense of satisfaction. After almost a lifetime of being a proponent of trading with China, Percival was at last witnessing the cementing of that relationship by both governments.

Enduring years of criticism at home for doing deals with ‘communists’, he was always convinced China would change. And change it did. In over 50 years of travelling to China, Percival was able to see firsthand the remarkable transition from the Mao era to almost the present day.

Percival was also the founding member of the New Zealand China Trade Association in 1981 and has twice been the association’s Chair and finally Honorary Lifetime Member. An NZCTA tribute to him says he was always ready to offer advice to NZ government officials and China traders, and was described by former prime minister Helen Clark as “the man who started it all’.

He told the Listener his China strategy meant he focused on business and stayed clear of politics. During the Cultural Revolution, Percival maintained his tempo of trips to the Canton Fair in Guangzhou, sourcing imports and brokering deals of New Zealand exports, all the time acquiring an influential network of friends within China and gaining a reputation.

His last formal appearance was in June 2010 when he attended a formal lunch for China’s visiting Vice President Xi Jinping at Parliament.

The New Zealand government paid tribute to his contribution to promoting his home country to the Chinese with an ONZM in 2008 but it is fair to say that among many Chinese officials he was held in even higher regard.

The Chinese government welcomed him with special ceremonies as an honoured guest in 2006 when he attended to the 100th Canton Fair. He had inadvertently become in the records of the Chinese authorities the only international trader still involved in China trade to have attended the Fair since its first year.

Percival was also named by the Chinese government in an official directory in 1996 along with two other New Zealanders, Rewi Alley and Kathleen Hall, among 500 Special Friends of China in the 20th century. International statesmen on the list included such figures as US President Richard Nixon, French President Charles de Gaulle and former US Secretary of State, Dr Henry Kissinger.

Asia:NZ director Dr Richard Grant says he met Victor Percival at the Canton Fair in April 1976. “He was already well known then as a pioneer in developing trade between China and New Zealand.  The stature by which he is held in China is indicative of the contribution he made to the warm relationship between the two countries over the decades.”

Percival first went to China in 1957 when he attended only the second Canton Fair to be held, the first having been held earlier that same year. The fairs are held twice yearly – in spring and autumn. He went on to attend 60 Canton Fairs.

Formally known as the China Export Commodities Fair, the Canton Fair which is held in the city of Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, has become one of the largest trade fairs in the world attended by thousands of international buyers sourcing their products from Chinese manufacturers.

Victor Percival ONZM died on July 24, 2010 at his home in Auckland aged 82.

Photo: Victor Percival pictured with Madam Xu Lin, a councillor of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, at the 100th Canton Trade Fair anniversary in 2006 in Guangzhou, China