Planned zone to streamline fragmented trade rules

China hopes a long-delayed plan to establish a free trade area in the Asia-Pacific region could make progress at a key summit that begins Wednesday in Beijing. The plan would unify fragmented trade rules and not conflict with a US-backed regional trade pact, a senior Chinese official said Tuesday.

A road map to the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP) is expected to be completed during the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, Wang Shouwen, assistant minister of commerce, told a press conference in Beijing.

The concept of the FTAAP was first mentioned by APEC members in 2006, but had not been pushed forward in previous summits. In May, China proposed studying the feasibility of a free trade agreement (FTA) in the Asia-Pacific region.

Currently, there are more than 50 bilateral and multilateral FTAs between APEC economies, leading to problems such as overlapping and malicious competition, experts said.

Existing trade mechanisms are highly fragmented, as current bilateral and multilateral FTAs are based on different standards and rules. Building a free trade area that covers all APEC economies is in accordance with all members' interests, He Weiwen, an executive council member of the China Society for WTO Studies, told the Global Times.

The 21-member APEC plays a significant role in the global economy. Currently, members account for 48 percent of world trade and 57 percent of global GDP, according to data provided by China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) on Tuesday.

"Once the FTAAP gets going, it will drive regional and global economic growth as well as push forward multilateral trade mechanisms," He said.

The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that the US has sought to block China's efforts to begin negotiations on the FTAAP. The report said China had wanted to set 2025 as the deadline to reach an agreement, but no deadline or feasibility would be mentioned in a communiqué to be released at the end of the leaders' forum.

"The FTAAP was not proposed by China, it is a consensus reached by all APEC members and there are no conflicts or obstructions," Wang stated Tuesday. "We hope that the APEC economies can propose a timetable as soon as possible, based on negotiations."

Xu Hongcai, director of the Department of Information under the China Center for International Economic Exchanges (CCIEE), believes that establishing the FTAAP is a long-term goal, and will not be realized within the next decade.

"China and the US, the two most important APEC economies, can reach some trade and investment agreements first, which will serve as a foundation for the FTAAP," Xu told the Global Times.

According to a blueprint unveiled by the CCIEE, the two countries can first conclude a bilateral investment treaty first, then move on to bilateral trade talks and initiation of FTA discussions. Once a Sino-US FTA is reached, the FTAAP would not be far off.

Wang from MOFCOM stressed that there is no conflict between the FTAAP and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a regional trade agreement led by the US and joined by 11 other APEC members without China.

The US planned to conclude TPP negotiations in 2014, but the US and Japan failed to reach a breakthrough over market access and other issues in the latest round of negotiations held in Sydney in late October.

"The US does not oppose the FTAAP, but its priority is pushing forward the TPP with the aim of creating the next generation of trade rules," He Weiwen said.

"That's why China aims to fulfill its coordinating role in promoting regional integration as host of the APEC summit," he added.

At Tuesday's press conference, Wang also reiterated China's determination to oppose trade protectionism in all forms.

China will encourage other APEC members to agree on an extension of a commitment to not raise new trade and investment barriers from 2016 to 2018, he said.

This is the second time that China has hosted the APEC summit, following a 13-year interval.

The country's GDP has expanded by more than five times in the intervening years.