Prime Minister Helen Clark today welcomed the announcement of a new training opportunity in Japan for fishing industry trainees.

The agreement between the Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Commission (Te Ohu Kai Moana) and Nippon Suisan Kaisha (Nissui) was secured during the April visit to Japan by Helen Clark and a delegation of business leaders.

Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Commission chief executive Robin Hapi was a member of the delegation.

Helen Clark said the scholarship, the Global Fisheries Training Programme, is worth more than $250,000 a year and will be jointly funded by the commission and Nissui, the joint owners of the Sealord Group Ltd.

"This programme offers high-level training for two Maori fisheries trainees each year, covering areas such as research and development, management, technology, and marketing and sales.

"The modern economy is knowledge intensive. Educated, skilled and enterprising people are going to drive our future as a nation, and programmes like this will help provide those people.

"Today's announcement meets a key objective of the April visit to Japan, which was to identify and develop new opportunities for the economic relationship between our two countries.

"It is very satisfying to see New Zealand beginning to reap benefits from that visit.

"I wish the Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Commission and Nissui well in this new venture and other efforts to build an increasingly productive and profitable relationship," Helen Clark said.

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