With the World Health Organisation (WHO) considering COVID-19 (coronavirus) a pandemic, businesses are struggling to keep their heads above water.
New Zealand exporters are expecting more disruptions as some parts of the world economy have started to shut down and cities and countries have gone into lockdown.
Andrew Locke, general manager commercial at Wellington’s CentrePort, reported a decrease in log volumes in February.
“We haven’t experienced any major impact yet concerning the container business. We’ve seen reduced shipments, but not loss of volumes. Our export volumes are still doing well, while our import volumes have maintained the status quo,” Locke told Stuff.co.nz. “Regarding the log business to China, we’re anticipating a soft March and April and like to think we’d turn the corner in May.”
Leah McNeil, spokeswoman for the Insurance Council of New Zealand (ICNZ), explained that natural disasters such as earthquakes would trigger catastrophe codes – but not a pandemic. Catastrophe codes allow the insurance sector to gather data and see the number of claims for an event and the cost of losses.
“We would look into the situation if it evolves. However, it’s not something we’d run a [catastrophe] code on,” McNeil told Stuff.co.nz.
She clarified that business interruption insurance might not cover damage or loss caused by the coronavirus outbreak.
“Normally, [the product] is triggered by a material loss. Having staff away from your business is not considered a material loss, but more a risk management or mitigation type event,” McNeil explained. “There might be some positions in some policies that provide specific cover for interruption on a shipping route, something along those lines.”
