India Weekender 23 Sep

Read online www.iwk.co.nz Friday, 23 September, 2022
NEW ZEALAND 3
NZ Traveller Declaration:
A necessary annoyance?
NAVDEEP KAUR MARWAH
It was on September 12
afternoon that Prime
Minister Jacinda Ardern
proudly announced that the
Covid-19 traffic light system
would end at 11.59 pm on
the same date, spelling the
end of more than two years of
Covid rules.
Ardern also confirmed
that masks would only be
required in health and aged
care settings, and household
contacts do not have to
isolate along with positive
cases if they return daily
negative RAT results.
“In short, we now move on
to a simple two requirements
system of masks in healthcare
settings and seven days of
isolation for positive cases
only,” Ardern said.
Though NZ has opened its
border and removed most
of the Covid-19 restrictions,
one thing that still stays is
the New Zealand Traveller
Declaration (NZTD). Simply
put, everyone travelling to
NZ by air must complete a
declaration and receive a
Traveller Pass before travelling.
Dr Ayesha Verrall
This includes NZ citizens and
residents, children and infants.
It means that travellers to NZ
still need to get government
permission to come to
Aotearoa, and for that, they
need to fill out an online form
which takes about 10 minutes
to fill.
For the uninitiated, the NZTA
system went live at 11.59 pm
on March 31, 2022, and was
primarily introduced to ensure
that people coming here had
vaccine passes, among others.
However, the government has
now dropped that requirement.
So, many people are asking
that since the government
has now removed most of the
covid-19 restrictions, including
wearing masks, why NZTD is
still there?
Prachi Rastogi, a Kiwi-Indian
Papakura resident, says, “I
don’t understand the logic of
having the Traveller declaration
now. It is both time consuming
and unnecessary stress for
travellers, especially old ones.”
"As a preparedness
measure our ability
to respond to a
potential new variant
of concern identified
offshore relies on
being able to contact
trace at pace. On
balance, I agree that
the maintenance
of this provision is
appropriate.”
- Dr Ayesha Verrall
Sharing the frustration
about the NZTD, another Kiwi-
Indian, Siddharth Verma, says,
“I think NZTD is just useless
and a complete waste of time.
When we travel, we already
provide similar information in
the Customs form but then
what is the need to fill in the
same information twice?
I don’t think NZTD serves
any purpose presently. The
Government should remove this
requirement.”
The Government
Response
To find the Government’s
rationale behind continuing
NZTD, Indian Weekender got
in touch with government
authorities.
Responding to our query,
Minister for Covid-19 Response
and Associate Minister of
Health, Dr Ayesha Verrall,
said, “The Director-General of
Health recommended that the
requirement to provide contact
details and travel history
information via the NZTD
system for air arrivals should
be retained to enable timely
contact tracing, should this be
needed.
"As a preparedness measure
our ability to respond to
a potential new variant of
concern identified offshore
relies on being able to contact
trace at pace. On balance, I
agree that the maintenance of
this provision is appropriate.”
• Continued on Page 13