Possible FTA with UK to allow for more concessions

THE HEAD of the Trade department said a bilateral trade deal with the United Kingdom (UK) following the latter’s planned exit from its economic bloc would provide give the Philippines leeway to negotiate more goods and services currently not included in its arrangement with the European Union (EU) as a whole.

Department of Trade and Industry ( DTI) Secretary Ramon M. Lopez cited “working on a possible free trade bilaterally” as one of the opportunities to be expected from the planned ‘Brexit.’

“Since it’s bilateral, it will allow us more flexibility in selecting products and services to be included in that bilateral arrangement which will be quite different from what we did with the entire EU,” he said in during the joint luncheon meeting held at the Fairmont Hotel in Makati City.

In the sidelines of the event, Mr. Lopez said discussions on a bilateral agreement will be “more or less timed when they really execute the exit.”

This was echoed by British Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to the Philippines Richard Graham, Member of Parliament (MP) for Glouceste, who said formal talks on any future free trade agreements (FTA) would not start until the UK leaves the economic bloc.

But even with just informal talks, Mr. Graham said there is “quite a lot of enthusiasm” for both countries to set an FTA.

“It’s so much easier, isn’t it, when you’re talking just about talking you and us rather than having 27 other countries involved negotiated by a third party called the EU,” he told reporters om the sidelines of the event.

Asked for specific sectors that would benefit from the possible preferential relationship, he said: “I don’t think we should try and tie it down specifically too much to individual sectors yet because we haven’t even started in formal talks.”

“We can’t start formal negotiations until we’ve left the EU so we do have a bit of time to try to prioritize which markets are important. Our international Trade Secretary Liam Fox will obviously be leading over this work over the next few months...,” he said.

According to data from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the UK is not included in the top 10 destination of Philippine exports. Asked to comment on this, Mr. Lopez said: “That doesn’t mean we should keep it that way. Now it gives us the opportunity to build a relationship in a stronger passion, arrangements that can really build on that from where are now and enhancing the trading arrangements because all of these concessions.”