MANILA — Philippine trade can receive a significant boost from the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) trade agreement, creating jobs for more Filipinos, said a ranking Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) official.
“That would mean more jobs because when you trade, you will open up more investments. And when you will have more investments, then you will have more jobs for Filipinos,” DFA Assistant Secretary for ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Affairs Maria Hellen de la Vega said in a recent interview in New Delhi, India.
RCEP aims to link ASEAN, an economic powerhouse with a market of 600 million people, to its six partner countries, creating a bigger market of 3.5 billion people.
ASEAN groups 10 countries — Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
These partner countries are Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand, with which ASEAN has free trade agreements (FTAs).
De la Vega particularly noted the “upward trajectory” of the growth of trade between ASEAN and India, one of its partner countries.
She considered India a “very important player in moving forward the RCEP” because it is a rising regional economic power in the region.
“This upward trajectory had helped of course and so this is one of the reasons why we are quite confident that it is really high time to conclude the RCEP between ASEAN and the other countries where we have FTAs,” she said.
De la Vega further said during Philippine chairmanship of ASEAN in 2017, leaders of RCEP participating countries made a decision that the trade agreement “should be concluded this year.”
“So it is up to the dialogue partners to act on it and really implement the decision,” she added. (Leslie Gatpolintan/PNA)