Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement For Trans-Pacific Partnership

Subject : International relations

Section: Groupings

Concept :

The UK acceded to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak describing the outcome as an example of “post-Brexit freedoms”.
The agreement will now need to be ratified by Westminster and each of the CPTPP countries.
The country will become the first new member, and the first in Europe, to join the agreement since it came into force in 2018.
The deal is a “gateway” to the Indo-Pacific region which would account for a majority (54%) of global economic growth in the future.
It will also, as a CPTPP member, get a veto on whether China joins the treaty.

About CPTPP

The CPTPP, also known as TPP-11, is a free trade agreement with 11 members: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, New Zealand, Singapore and Vietnam.
The eleven signatories have combined economies representing 13.4 percent of global gross domestic product, at approximately US$13.5 trillion, making the CPTPP one of the world’s largest free-trade areas by GDP, along with the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement, the European Single Market, and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.
It succeeded the Trans-Pacific Partnership after the United States withdrew under former President Donald Trump in 2017.
The bloc is home to more 500 million people and will be worth 15% of global GDP once the United Kingdom joins.
Beijing had applied to become a member of the bloc in September 2021.
The CPTPP commission in 2023 is chaired by New Zealand.
All 11 countries of CPTPP are members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)

It is a forum of 21 Asia-Pacific economies established in 1989.
Members: Australia; Brunei Darussalam; Canada; Chile; People’s Republic of China; Hong Kong, China; Indonesia; Japan; Republic of Korea; Malaysia; Mexico; New Zealand; Papua New Guinea; Peru; the Philippines; the Russian Federation; Singapore; Chinese Taipei; Thailand; the United States of America; Vietnam.
It seeks to promote free trade and economic cooperation throughout the Asia-Pacific region.
The APEC Secretariat, headquartered in Singapore, provides advisory and logistic services as well as research and analysis.
APEC decisions are reached by consensus, and commitments are made on a voluntary basis.