New Zealand lawyers are being urged to engage with the Asia-Pacific region’s most significant legal network as the Inter-Pacific Bar Association (IPBA) prepares to hold its annual conference in Sydney from 7 to 10 April 2027.
The conference, to be held at the Hyatt Regency Sydney, is expected to draw more than a thousand delegates from 65 jurisdictions. The conference returns to the city for the first time since 2006, bringing the IPBA’s international membership within a short flight of New Zealand.
Wenee Yap, a Sydney-based legal technology consultant who assists the IPBA with marketing and promotion, said the conference’s return to the city after more than two decades was significant. “For the first time in 21 years, our region is being highlighted. That’s what’s different,” she said. Yap described the IPBA as “an unusually collegial organisation,” saying its 1,500 members connected primarily through in-person conferences. “Coming together at international conferences like the one in Sydney in April is really an opportunity to understand how other people are practising across our region, the challenges that are facing us all.”
The Law Association Chief Executive Clayton Kimpton attended the IPBA’s most recent annual conference in New Delhi earlier this year, where he spoke on a panel on the entry of non-lawyers into the legal services market. He said the experience showed him what New Zealand lawyers stood to gain from international engagement.
“It’s not until you attend a conference like that, that you appreciate the benefits of engaging with lawyers across the Asia-Pacific who are all focused on both sector leadership and excellence, but also on building connections with both clients and colleagues in other markets,” Kimpton said.
He said New Zealand’s contribution to the Delhi panel, which also included representatives from India, Singapore and Malaysia, was well received. “New Zealand’s perspective was welcomed. It’s as important as Singapore or India or Malaysia, and it’s really good to see. It’s very respected.”
Kimpton said IPBA membership offered New Zealand lawyers three practical benefits: involvement in specialist committees aligned with their practice areas, a network from which to build international workflow, and the opportunity to present papers and build a reputation beyond New Zealand’s borders. “What we want to do as The Law Association is enable that for more and more people,” he said.
The Law Association is encouraging its committee convenors in particular to consider presenting at the Sydney conference. Kimpton pointed to anti-money laundering as an area where New Zealand practitioners had something distinctive to contribute. “We’ve got a much deeper experience of AML within professional services than Australia has, because it’s only just started there. This is an opportunity to share experience, information and expertise and build the reputation and experience of our own legal profession here.”
Wenee Yap said New Zealand had more to contribute to the international stage than it often recognised. She said the country shared with Singapore an ability to serve as a stable, respected reference point for the wider region. “New Zealand can position itself much like Singapore does,” she said. “That particular country is a single metropolis island with no natural resources and yet is the leverage point for the entire region because it’s considered super stable.” She described New Zealand as having “a uniquely international way of seeing the world” and as “the ultimate challenger brand,” adding: “If you’ve always had to do everything with nothing, you’re always going to find a way to do it.”
Before the Sydney conference, The Law Association will hold an event on Friday 27 November at its Auckland office, bringing together members and senior IPBA leadership. IPBA President Priti Suri and President-elect James Jung will attend and will be signing an MOU with The Law Association. The event will give New Zealand lawyers an early opportunity to hear from IPBA leadership about what the Sydney conference has to offer.
Yap said the most straightforward path into the IPBA was to attend the conference first, then consider membership. “The easiest way in is to become a member and go to a conference at the first instance,” she said. Members can apply to join any of the 24 committees covering practice areas from technology and employment to environmental law and AML.
Kimpton said the Sydney conference represented a golden opportunity for New Zealand lawyers willing to take it. “The conference in April is a chance for them to easily engage with leading practitioners from around the world, to get a sense of what legal developments are occurring globally and how they’re going to impact New Zealand,” he said. “Anyone who attends is going to come back richer for it.”
0 Comments