Pacific trade deal reached, leaders won't endorse it yet
DANANG, VIETNAM — Trade ministers from 11 Pacific Rim countries announced an agreement yesterday on pushing ahead with a freetrade deal whose destiny was uncertain after President Donald Trump dropped it.
"We have reached an agreement on a number of fundamental parts," Vietnam's trade minister, Tran Tuan Anh, told reporters in the coastal resort city of Danang, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. But more work must be done before leaders of the countries involved can endorse the plan, said Anh and his Japanese counterpart, Toshimitsu Motegi.
The 11 counties remaining in the trade pact rejected by Trump in January have been working to revise the deal to allow them to proceed without U.S. involvement. That involved a difficult balance between maintaining high standards and pragmatism, Motegi said.
"Through a pragmatic response of the officials involved we could come to an agreement," Motegi said. He said it was clear there would be a need for further changes but that differences had been narrowed down. "The substance is something all the TPP countries can agree on. This will send a very strong message to the US and the other countries in the region."
The talks resulted in an even longer name for the trade pact than originally devised. It is now the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.
The announcement of a basic agreement was delayed by last-minute discord that prevented the TPP leaders from endorsing the plan when Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did not join other leaders who gathered Friday to endorse an agreement in principle on pressing ahead without the US.
In the end, Canada's Minister for International Commerce Francois-P Champagne said in a tweet yesterday that "after lots of work, big progress on the 'Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership.'" Trudeau had said days earlier that Canada would not be rushed into an agreement.
Despite enthusiasm for sticking with the plan following the US withdrawal, criticism over various issues persists. Detractors of the TPP say it favors corporate interests over labor and other rights. Trudeau said days before arriving in Danang that he would not be rushed into signing an agreement that did not suit Canada's interests.
Aspects of the trade pact have also raised hackles over a requirement that companies be allowed to sue governments for lack of enforcement of related laws.
The proposed basic agreement reached in Danang said that the ministers maintained "the high standards, overall balance and integrity of the TPP while ensuring the commercial and other interests of all participants and preserving our inherent right to regulate, including the flexibility of the parties to set legislative and regulatory priorities."