Surface Trade

An update which I received from the II-EI in Phoenix, Arizona earlier this month had a heading which grabbed my attention.  It read:

March 2010 Surface Trade with Canada and Mexico Rose 37.0 Percent from March 2009

It was the phrase surface trade which did the grabbing!  Of course it means trade using surface transportation between the US and its NAFTA partners.   I realised that New Zealand doesn't have surface trade to anywhere becasue we aren't connected to any other landmass!   Well not until there is a bridge to Australia which is our major export partner - it could be called the CER Bridge.   That's Closer Economic Relations for readers not in Australia or New Zealand and was the title of the Free Trade Agreement between the two countries signed in 1983.