Vietnam attends meeting in Australia to accelerate TPP

Speaking at the opening ceremony on August 28, head of the Australian TPP negotiation delegation Justin Brown expressed his hope that all the 11 nations will reach a final agreement so that the trade deal spanning the Pacific will take effect after the APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting scheduled for November in Vietnam’s central city of Da Nang 

Although there are a number of hurdles, Australia commits to joining hands with the remaining ten countries to make the agreement effective for mutual benefits of the participants, he stressed.

Meanwhile, head of the Japanese delegation Kazuyoshi Umemoto said that the 11 countries need to promote solidarity so that the TPP can come into force soon.

In the three-day meeting, the negotiators will discuss measures to amend the original TPP document in accordance with the new context.

Once effective, the TPP will link 11 countries, including four of the world’s top 20 economies, with combined gross domestic product (GDP) of about 9.8 trillion USD. 

It would result in 19 new free trade agreements coming into force.

The TPP was signed in February 2016 by Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam.

However, US President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of the world's biggest economy from the TPP soon after taking office in January 2017.-