RCEP Trade Ministers reaffirm their commitment to a pact to promote inclusive economic integration

The trade ministers of the 16 countries of the Global Regional Economic Partnership (RCEP), including India and China, pledged to reach an agreement that would facilitate regional economic integration.

The trade pact is intended to cover goods, services, investment, economic and technical cooperation, competition and intellectual property rights.

Ministers recognized the importance of a successful conclusion of the pact given the current global trading environment that faces serious risks of unilateral trade actions and responses, declared a joint statement. ministerial meeting held in Tokyo on 1 July

Anup Wadhawan, Special Services Officer (SDO) and Trade Secretary, represented Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu at the meeting.

"… Ministers reaffirmed their willingness to work together and through the RCEP negotiations to reach an agreement that would allow economies of different levels of development to actively participate and benefit from integration. open and inclusive regional economy, "he added,

to work more closely to find progress towards the conclusion of the negotiations.

" To this end, the ministers instructed the negotiators to concentrate their Efforts They also asked the negotiators to improve the market access offers.

The meeting takes on importance as pressure builds on India for the swift conclusion of the proposed pact. 19659002] The RCEP group comprises 10 asean members (Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Laos and Vietnam) and their six FTA partners – India, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand

The talks dragged on as member countries want an agreement to eliminate tariffs on the maximum number of products traded between them. However, countries like India have some reservations about this because the group includes China, with which New Delhi has a huge trade deficit.

The Indian industry and exporters fear the presence of China in the grouping. They said lowering or eliminating duties for China could flood Indian markets with Chinese products.

Moreover, countries like India want greater liberalization of trade in services, key element of the national economy. the story was not edited by Business Standard staff and is generated automatically from a syndicated feed.)