China to push ‘alternative’ trade pact at APEC: minister
‘Facilitator for regional integration’
BEIJING, Nov 10, (AFP): China will seek to push its own vision of an AsiaPacific trade pact at a regional summit next week, senior officials said Tuesday, after this month’s release of a rival US-led deal that pointedly excludes the Asian giant.
Beijing sought to promote the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP) at last year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, which it hosted.
At the meeting’s close, participants endorsed efforts to explore the idea, which was seen as a potential rival to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a 12-nation, Washington-led trade coalition that includes the region’s largest economies, except China.
Little has been heard of the FTAAP since, while the long-secret text of the TPP was released Thursday, receiving cheers from global business interests and jeers from labour, environmental and health groups, which vowed to fight its ratification.
The TPP would be the world’s biggest free trade area, an attempt to break down barriers to commerce and investment between a dozen countries comprising about 40 percent of the global economy.
China said it would report the findings of a study on FTAAP at next week’s APEC summit in the Philippines, to be attended by President Xi Jinping.
“We need to actively work for the establishment of FTAAP,” Chinese vice commerce minister Wang Shouwen told a briefing, adding that the trade pact would be “a facilitator for regional integration in APEC”.
If ultimately realised, FTAAP would be the world’s largest free trade area, encompassing TPP and other regional frameworks.
APEC’s 21 members account for more than 50 percent of global GDP and nearly half of world trade.
Although it gathers some of the world’s most important leaders, the group’s annual meeting is a better known for its group photos of powerful people in matching shirts than substantive deals.
But Wang said China remains hopeful that the group will complete a roadmap for establishing the FTAAP framework.
“Our objective is to complete the joint strategic study next year and to present operable suggestions and recommendations to the leaders at next year’s summit,” he said, adding that a progress report would be presented to leaders in Manila.
Vice foreign minister Li Baodong added that it was important to ensure sustainable Asia-Pacific growth so that the region “can continue to play its role as an engine for world economic growth”.
China has latched onto the FTAAP, first put forward by APEC in 2006, as a hedge against the US-led TPP, a key element of Washington’s “Asia pivot”.
Although the United States has said it is open to Chinese participation in the TPP, it has excluded the world’s number two economy from negotiations.
US President Barack Obama has insisted he wants China “to do well” despite simmering tensions between the two powerhouses.
“The United States welcomes the rise of a prosperous, peaceful and stable China,” he said at last year’s APEC summit.
But at home, he has repeatedly used Beijing as a bugbear to scare up cooperation from an intransigent congress to support the deal.
Obama, who strongly pushed the TPP as a foundation for “21st century trade”, heralded the pact as a boost to the US economy that would also protect workers and the environment.