UK Backs Indonesia’s CPTPP Trade Pact Push

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaks with President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo on the sidelines of the G7 Summit in Hiroshima on May 20, 2023. (Photo Courtesy of Presidential Press Bureau)

Jakarta. The UK wants Indonesia to follow in its footsteps in joining the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), saying that it will help with Jakarta’s candidacy.

The CPTPP is a trade pact encompassing Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. The UK was recently accepted as the pact’s twelfth and first non-founding member. 

Indonesia has been eyeing membership in the CPTPP in a move to unlock non-traditional markets, including Latin America.

Southeast Asia’s biggest economy is also currently trying to get into the rich-country club of the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) of which the UK is also a member.

British Minister of State for Indo-Pacific Anne-Marie Trevelyan recently met with senior minister Airlangga Hartarto in London. In the meeting, Trevelyan declared the UK’s support for Indonesia’s membership in both groupings.

“We are ready to share our experience and help with the accession process,” Trevelyan told Airlangga, as quoted by a ministerial press release.

According to Trevelyan, Indonesia should build “mutual understanding” in the process of joining both blocs. The Indonesian government should also involve its private sector to take advantage of the trade pact and create added values in the long term.

The CPTPP makes up 13.4 percent of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP). This amounts to about $13.5 trillion in combined GDP. Airlangga claimed that Indonesia had already complied with most of the provisions that the CPTPP trade pact had set out, thus Jakarta should not have any trouble joining the trade bloc. “Our preliminary study on the 30-chapter CPTPP pact shows that approximately 70 percent of the domestic regulations have aligned [with the agreement],” Airlangga said.

The CPTPP agrees to eliminate over 98 percent of tariffs in the trade area. The pact also requires countries to treat goods imported from the other signatories no less favorably than domestic ones. The UK wrapped up the negotiations to join the CPTPP on March 13, 2023. The country then inked the accession protocol last July. It is now waiting for ratification by the bloc’s members. Japan, Singapore, and Chile have ratified the UK’s accession to the CPTPP.

Source:Jakarta Globe