PH to sign ASEAN-India FTA

The government has assured India of its formal concurrence to the services and investments agreement under the ASEAN-India Comprehensive Economic Cooperation before end this year.

Trade and Industry Secretary Gregory L. Domingo said after his return from the recently concluded East Asia and India-ASEAN summits in Myanmar.

President Benigno Aquino gave his assurance to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during their bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the summits. The Philippines is the only country in the 10-nation ASEAN to sign a Free Trade Agreement for services and investments with India. India has formally signed the long-pending pact with the other nine southeast Asian nations: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

“We commit to submit our formal concurrence this year. Once done, the agreement is all set for implementation,” Domingo said.

All the government agencies involved are required to approve the formal concurrence.

Although the formal concurrence is just a matter of procedure, Domingo said the agreement cannot be implemented without the Philippines’ formal concurrence.

The services agreement will open up opportunities of movement of both manpower and investments. The pact will also allow India to leverage its competitive edge in the areas of finance, education, health, IT, telecommunications and transport.

It seeks to liberalize trade in services and bilateral investment, building on their existing free trade agreement (FTA) for goods and covering a combined population of 1.8 billion.

The agreement is also seen to help balance India's deficit with ASEAN countries in trade of goods. The India– ASEAN agreement on trade in goods was operationalized in 2010. The current India-ASEAN trade is around $81 billion and a target of $100 billion has been set for 2015. The FTA will help provide a commercially meaningful market across ASEAN for India's professionals.