TPP: 11 nations agree on preparation deadline (Business Times, 22 May 2017)
ASIA has been warned many times against creating a “spaghetti bowl” of conflicting trade agreements, and with trade chiefs from three major powers pushing their own ideas at a series of weekend meetings in Hanoi, the prospects for general agreement on an Asia-wide accord remained highly uncertain. During the two-day gathering, Japan succeeded in putting the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) back on the table despite the fact that US President Donald Trump has said he will have no part of it, while Japan also agreed with Washington that a bilateral trade accord could be discussed. China, meanwhile, continued to recommend that the Regional Cooperative Economic Partnership (RCEP) be the centrepiece of a regional trade agreement in order to bring more countries (including itself) to the table. RCEP will be the subject of a further meeting in May in Hanoi.