Vietnam is working fast to repair business gaps in anticipation of a myriad of bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements (FTA) expected to be signed in 2015. Commenting on FTA impacts, Chairman of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) Vu Tien Loc said domestic firms will be able to enter major markets worldwide with minimal tariffs and barriers, such as the US, Europe, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the ASEAN, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

HA NOI (VNS) — The bilateral trade turnover between Viet Nam and the United Kingdom reached GBP2.8 billion (US$4.5 billion) last year, reflecting a year-on-year drop of 2 per cent. The numbers were recently released by the commerce division of the Vietnamese Embassy in the UK. Of the total, the embassy said, Viet Nam's export value to the UK came to somewhere around $3.95 billion. The key export products were mobile phones, garments and textiles, footwear and timber furniture.

Negotiations have been finalized in preparation for the launch of Africa’s largest free trade area in May, officials said on Tuesday.

SEJONG, Feb. 25 (Yonhap) — South Korea and China initialed their free trade agreement (FTA) Wednesday, taking a step closer to implementing what South Korean officials hail as the most significant trade deal for the country. The initialing came about three months after the two countries concluded their FTA negotiations that began in May 2012. The agreement, currently written only in English, will be translated into the two parties’ native languages before it is officially signed.

Ongoing European Union (EU)-Vietnam free trade negotiations are reaching a critical point. Although negotiations have advanced well so far, the most difficult part of the talks still lies ahead of Brussels and Hanoi, a hearing at the EU parliament revealed. Some idea of the likely carve-outs from trade liberalisation in this politically sensitive deal for both parties starts emerging.

Improving the competitiveness of the national economy and that of Vietnamese businesses to make the most of the opportunities that integration might bring about has become an urgent task.

By the end of 2014, TPP members underwent 19 official rounds of negotiations and many others at chief negotiator and ministerial levels along with high-level meetings. They had finalized negotiations on cooperation and capacity building; Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs); For the development, cohesion policy and the environment facilitating the supply chain; Customs; Food safety and animal and plant quarantine; Telecommunications; Competition policy (not including the issue of State-owned enterprises). 

Feb 10 (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday vowed to keep pushing for rules against currency cheating in trade deals as they unveiled bipartisan legislation to stop America's trading partners from manipulating exchange rates. The bill comes on top of efforts to include rules against deliberate weakening of currencies in a Pacific trade agreement and in upcoming legislation to fast track trade deals through Congress.

HA NOI (VNS) — The Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta provinces expect to export seafood and rice worth US$10.2 billion this year, according to the Can Tho Statistics Office. The provinces reported $850 million worth of exports for seafood and rice in January alone. The office estimates that to achieve this target, the region will have to produce 3.7 million tonnes of seafood to meet demand for raw material from 198 seafood processing factories in the region.

TOKYO — Japan and Mongolia signed a free trade agreement Tuesday that is expected to open the landlocked frontier market to more Japanese auto exports and strengthen Tokyo’s leverage with a key partner in its dealings with North Korea. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his Mongolian counterpart Chimed Saikhanbileg signed the agreement at a summit in Tokyo.