China and the 10-country Association of South East Asian Nations on Friday launched the final stage of the world’s biggest regional trade agreement, measured by population, in spite of Indonesia’s last-minute attempts at renegotiation.
The launch of the China-Asean Free Trade Agreement, which covers almost 1.9bn people, coincides with the implementation of a similar deal with Australia and New Zealand and a deepening of Asean’s own internal trading agreements.
Taken together with earlier deals with Japan, South Korea and India, the New Year day accord puts south-east Asia at the centre of a series of regional trade agreements extending from Beijing to Wellington and from New Delhi to Tokyo.
The China-Asean deal takes effect following the completion last summer of an agreement on investment rules, the last leg of an eight-year negotiating marathon that produced earlier agreements on goods and services.
Tariffs have been falling since 2005, with 90 per cent of goods due to be tariff free from Friday for China and the six core Asean members – Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei. The target is 2015 for the other four – Laos, Cambodia, Burma and Vietnam