EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

Maurice Crosby - Chair
Maurice Crosby is a director of Jack Links New Zealand Ltd whose business is the manufacturing and sale of Beef Jerky and a range of similar meat snacks. Jack Link’s exports in excess of 2,500 tons of Jerky each year to America, Asia, Australia and the Middle East as well as servicing a growing demand in the NZ domestic market. Korea is a key growth market for Jack Links due to the Korean familiarity with Jerky and a strong growth in recent years of this category in Korean stores. The company has a modern production facility located near Auckland International Airport.

Fergus McLean - Deputy Chair
Fergus assumed the role of Deputy Chair at the Council's AGM on 20 May 2021. Prior to that he was the Executive Director of the Council for about 20 years. Fergus spent most of his career in the Government's various trade promotion agencies -initially the Department of Industries and Commerce, and subsequently the Dept of Trade and Industry, the Market Development Board, the Trade Development Board, and Trade New Zealand (Tradenz). He served as New Zealand Trade Commissioner in Brussels (also covering the Netherlands, and all the Scandinavian countries), Vienna(covering all the (then) socialist countries of Eastern Europe) and Canberra, at the time when the CER Trade agreement between the two countries was being negotiated and finalised. After he left Tradenz, rather than retire, he managed four bilateral business councils (including the KNZBC), undertook a number of export research contracts with the School of Management at Victoria University, and did part-time work for the Wellington Chamber of Commerce.

(appointment pending) - Treasurer

Michael Park - Vice Chair
Michael Park has wide trade and commerce experience within the private sector, spanning nearly 30 years.  He has contributed substantially to the fostering of effective business relationships within all aspects of these industries, with particular emphasis on international relations between New Zealand and Korea. Michael has been a founding member of Korea New Zealand Business Council and is currently the vice chairman. Michael has accumulated an impressive network of business contacts in Korea. He has to date enjoyed the successful management of several companies and continues to be esteemed as a leader within the Korean Community in New Zealand. Michael has established the New Zealand Centre in Seoul, Korea, in 2005 and has been promoting New Zealand culture and education in particular as the chairman.

Charles Kim - Executive Committee
Charles Kim supplies New Zealand genuine products mainly to the Korean market in Auckland, and exports to Korea and USA. The final products are NZ Omega3, NZ EPO, NZ royal jellies, Manuka honeys, NZ colostrum products, NZ propolis, NZ green shell mussel products, www.lindenleaves.com products, www.redseal.co.nz products, and many others.

David Kim - Executive Committee
David Sung Han Kim is a specialist in Investment & Retail Banking, Finance and Strategies Planning , Director of The Partners Financial Limited a company is one of the leading boutique Financial Service providers also the professional and experienced International business consulting company especially for Korean Business matters. The Partners Financial offers expertise, customised financial solutions, Investment Strategies and also link with right business partners and opportunities for client.

Emma Beggs - Executive Committee
Emma Beggs is a Trade Strategist at Fonterra, working to drive engagement and advocacy on global strategic trade, sustainability and geo-political issues. Prior to this, Emma was part of the Business Graduate Programme, and spent time in various sales and technical functions across Fonterra. Emma has a Law Degree and a BAppSC in Consumer Food Science from the University of Otago.

Hansol Cha - Executive Committee
Hansol Cha is a Business Development Manager at Lanaco. a global leader of high performance natural wool air filtration technology, where he leads local and international business development and partnership opportunities. As a Korean-born Kiwi, he is passionate about connecting NZ & Korean businesses to drive collaborative cross-border partnerships in emerging technologies. He has been actively involved in organising NZ-Korea Technology Road Show with New Zealand Chamber of Commerce in Korea (the Kiwi Chamber) since 2019 to boost investment and R&D partnerships between NZ & Korea technology firms. Hansol has worked for a number of NZ & Korean high-tech firms and cross-border innovation agencies including UniServices, Victoria University of Wellington, StretchSense, Nanolayr and POSCO. He raduated from University of Auckland with ME (Hons) with Chemical & Materials Engineering, specialising in nanomaterials.

Holly Huh - Executive Committee
Holly Huh is a Financial Advisor and working at the Partners Financial Ltd as one of the directors. She has been in the Banking industry for 27 years, specially working over 20 years in NZ Banks. She was the founding member who set up Korean Banking with NBNZ in early 1990s and successfully set up for the correspondent banking relationship between Korea and NZ. She continued her career as a Senior Manager of business development with ASB and helped new immigrant’s settling in New Zealand.

Joshua Jo - Executive Committee
Joshua is a Business Development & Strategy Manager at BNZ specialising on working with businesses with a focus on Asia, exporting, and creative technologies. Joshua has over ten years of enterprise-wide business strategy, business development, consultative sales and account management experience having worked at Australasia’s leading insights and customer experience agency as well as a global leader firm in audience insights, data and, analytics. With BCom(Hons) & LLB degrees from the University of Auckland, Joshua is also fluent in both English and Korean and can advise those with bespoke banking needs.


Ken Oh - Executive Committee
Ken Oh is an alumnus of Law School at University of Auckland and the principal lawyer of Kenton Chambers Lawyers. He has over 25 years of various legal experience including his tenure at top-tier law firms such as Bell Gully in New Zealand and at Kim and Chang in South Korea. He has practiced in wide range of legal areas including Investment in domestic & international, property, Intellectual Property, conveyancing, commercial, corporate, Immigration and more. Using his profound knowledge accumulated through the vast amount of experience, he continues to pursue his practice helping those in need of his services. Currently, he is a specialist lawyer in Immigration Law, assisting clients with their respective visa applications and consulting their pathway to residency here in New Zealand.

Laura Bunting - Executive Committee
Laura is Programme Manager at the North Asia Centre of Asia-Pacific Excellence (NA CAPE). The NA CAPE seeks to develop New Zealander’s long-term capacity to engage with Korea, leveraging academic expertise as appropriate. Operating across the business and education sectors Laura has worked to develop new programmes and initiatives to promote NZ-Korean engagement and foster people-to-people connections. Laura graduated from the University of Melbourne having majored in Economics and History. She completed her thesis on Chinese Offshore Foreign Direct Investment at the University of Auckland, and has contributed to a book on Chinese Economic Statecraft.

Melanie Crawford - Executive Committee
Melanie Crawford - Melanie Crawford is the Senior International Relations Advisor at Wellington City Council. She has experience working in a range of diverse environments both in New Zealand and overseas, including 11 years with the Asia New Zealand Foundation where she managed the Leadership Network, a global professional network focused on developing and maintaining strong links between Aotearoa and Asia. Prior to joining Wellington City Council, she held stakeholder engagement positions with Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, and the Ministry of Youth Development.

Wookjin Lee - Executive Committee
Partner at Dentons Kensington Swan. Wook Jin is an experienced transactional lawyer who advises listed issuers, private businesses, private equity fund managers and high net worth individuals on the full suite of corporate advisory matters. His expertise includes advising on M&A, JV arrangements, corporate governance, and equity capital raising transactions. He also advises on business-critical commercial contracts and compliance with New Zealand company and financial markets legislation. He is fluent in Korean and particularly well positioned to advise Korean corporate clients on their cross-border investment transactions.

New Zealand Trade & Enterprise (represented by Suzy Fewtrell)
Suzy Fewtrell is the Market Manager for East Asia including, Japan and Korea at New Zealand Trade & Enterprise. For the past 14 years Suzy has been living in China where she owned and ran a very successful business before working for NZTE in Shanghai. Suzy has now returned to New Zealand where she is focused on her role as the NZ contact point for East Asia. She works closely with NZ Inc partners and helps resolve issues NZ businesses have with the East Asia region, supporting the Regional Director and Trade Commissioners to achieve their goals of growing NZ businesses in their respective markets. Suzy advises on East Asia issues and concerns, develops programmes for visiting government delegations and gives input to the NZTE teams offshore within East Asia.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (represented by Rachel Maidment) - ex Officio

Simon Appleton - Executive Director
Simon is the founder of Eastern Bridge, a company designed to support two way connections between New Zealand and Asia. Prior to starting his business he worked for local government in New Zealand where he focused on Economic Development. Simon has spent a number of years in Asia including three in South Korea and seven in China. During his time in Asia Simon worked for both public and private organisations as well as operating his own consulting firm. He is a speaker of Mandarin Chinese and has a conversational level of Korean.