The United States-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement, sometimes called the Colombia Free Trade Agreement or FTA, was signed on November 22, 2006.The Colombia FTA is a comprehensive free trade agreement.  When the Colombia FTA enters into force, Colombia will immediately eliminate most of its tariffs on U.S. exports, with all remaining tariffs phased out over defined time periods.

The United States and the Republic of Korea signed the United States-Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS FTA) on June 30, 2007. If approved, the Agreement would be the United States' most commercially significant free trade agreement in more than 16 years.The U.S. International Trade Commission estimates that the reduction of Korean tariffs and tariff-rate quotas on goods alone would add $10 billion to $12 billion to annual U.S. Gross Domestic Product and around $10 billion to annual merchandise exports to Korea.

The United States and Panama signed a trade promotion agreement, sometimes called a Free Trade Agreement (FTA)on June 28, 2007. Panama approved the TPA on July 11, 2007. The United States has not yet approved the TPA.U.S.-Panama FTA is a comprehensive free trade agreement that can result in significant liberalization of trade in goodsand services, including financial services.

We now know, courtesy of Wikileaks, that the assessment of Japan’s DPJ, at the highest levels of the US government, was that it was ‘completely different’ from the LDP.At first, this appeared to be the case. It was not just the Futenma debacle, although that was bad enough. The Hatoyama government’s apparent reneging on an earlier US base realignment agreement was taken as a signal that the new DPJ administration not only wanted to put greater distance between itself and the United States but also desired to reduce the American military presence in Japan.

The recommendation on negotiating position and strategies for Vietnam in TPP negotiations is made by the Committee on International Trade Policies of VCCI on behalf of Vietnamese business community to send to the state Agencies in charge of negotiating TPP. This Recommendation is made on the basis of desk study, discussion among specialists, survey on business associations and enterprises’ opinions.Download the Recommendation Draft here:

Challenges for Vietnam in the TPP Negotiations

IntroductionThe TPP was previously known as the Pacific Three Closer Economic Partnership (P3-CEP), its negotiations launched on the sidelines of the 2002 APEC Leaders' Meeting in Los Cabos, Mexico, by Chilean President Ricardo Lagos and Prime Ministers Goh Chok Tong of Singapore and Helen Clark of New Zealand. Brunei first took part as a full negotiating party in the fifth round of talks in April 2005, after which the trade bloc became known as the Pacific-4 (P4).

On December 24th, 2010, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) held the “Third Meeting – The Committee on International Trade Policies” in Hanoi. This event belongs to VCCI’s Program “Enterprises and International Trade Policies” in the framework of Project MUTRAP III (Multilateral Trade Assistance Project, Component III EU – Vietnam) sponsored by European Union.

The United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (1980) (CISG), adopted by a diplomatic conference on 11 April 1980, establishes a comprehensive code of legal rules governing the formation of contracts for the international sale of goods, the obligations of the buyer and seller, remedies for breach of contract and other aspects of the contract. Until now, CISG has 74 country members without Vietnam.

This research, carried out by the Committee on International Trade Policies, aims to  enhance the participation of Vietnamese businesses into the International Trade Policy Making Process in Vietnam.Download Research Report here: