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This report is categorized into four categories: (I) Background, (II) U.S.-Andean Trade, (III) Selected Issues in the Negotiations and (IV) Prospects.

This Report is categorized into four categories: (I) Background, (II) U.S.-Andean Trade, (III) Selected Issues in the Negotiations and (IV) Prospects.

Singapore has entered into a number of bilateral Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with its trading partners. These FTAs vary in scope and commitments. As a result, Singapore's legal environment and laws have seen some changes. Many of these changes would interest those who do business with or invest in Singapore. While this section does not attempt to provide comprehensive information on all changes resulting from treaty commitments, it highlights salient changes for those trading or investing in Singapore. The developments highlighted here include changes made to Singapore legislation, as well as legal commitments made by Singapore as a result of its treaty obligations. Users are advised to consult the texts and related documents of each FTA for a full appreciation of the benefits that they or their countries may be eligible for. Information about Singapore's concluded agreements, and agreements still under negotiation, can be found here.

This paper reviews elements of the history of association agreements between the EU and countries that are covered by the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). It considers the rationale for negotiation of Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas with neighbouring countries based on research that assesses the design, salience and incentive effects of such agreements. It makes a case that developments in the global economy and the experience with using trade agreements to pursue deeper integration of markets suggest that alternatives to DCFTAs may be more effective instruments for cooperation for both sides. The 2015 review of the ENP creates new opportunities to consider such alternatives. These could span sectoral agreements, more focused efforts targeting specific policy areas that have a significant impact on trade costs, and initiatives that centre on the adoption of international standards and internationally recognized good regulatory practices.

It has been more than a decade since the European Union (EU) set standards for the international labor rights in its Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). The mentioned standards allow involvement of civil society groups via institutional channel. In particular it entails, implementation of sustainable development and trade part of the FTA through introduction and implementation of labor rights and environmental/climate protection involving Jointly established Domestic Advisory Groups (DAG).Civil society representatives, represented at DAGs are assisting the EU and its Partners / Contracting Parties in fulfilling Trade and Sustainable Development mandate. The DAGs also include stakeholders who ensure sustainable development in terms of environmental / climate / labor protection.The Joint Statements issued by the DAGs of Georgia and the EU during 2016-2019, define the level of involvement of Non-governmental organizations as well as priority issues. At the same time, this is also possible to define their role at different stages of adopting the relevant legislation as well as implementation of the policy.The article reviewed impact of Georgian civil society, namely DAGs in the implementation and management of trade and sustainable development chapter by the Georgian state as stipulated in the Association Agreement. In various countries, studies regarding civil control mechanisms in FTAs are usual practice, although in terms of Georgian context this is a novelty.On balance, since 2014 Georgia has institutionalized public control that focuses on civic control in the implementation of trade and sustainable development issues. Content analysis conducted within the study found that the role of the civil society sector is consistently emphasized and the appropriateness of their involvement is requested and considered by the parties and relevant procedural issues are present.

The European Union has recently shifted to a trade policy that envisages a greater use of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). In particular the EU is working on a number of new FTA initiatives. Policy statements also reiterate the EU's commitment to multilateralism in trade and to the completion of the stalled Doha Development Agenda. This paper considers the background to the shift towards a more active use of FTAs, the motivations and forces that have brought about the shift in policy, and the likely EU objectives with regard to the content of the FTAs. Unlike the US the EU has no "model FTA" to form the basis of negotiations with all partners. In assessing the outlines of the EU negotiating mandates for these new FTAs it is, however, possible to also draw on recent policy statements and the studies and reports produced on each possible new FTA. Finally, the paper discusses whether the EU can reconcile this greater emphasis on bilateral FTAs with its commitment to multilateralism in trade.

The Government has stated its intention of making all efforts to enterNAFTA as soon as possible. It wants to widen its markets and gainadvantages for exports. In Congress and public opinion in the United States there is opposition to the idea, based on Colombia's flagrant violations of human rights, and accusations that the drug-traffickers have infiltrated the economy and politics. Curiously, though,Colombian exports have had privileged access to Europe and the United States, but Colombia has not taken advantage of this and the balanceof trade ins negative. The success of integration does not depend one conomic policy alone: social policy must also come into play. ; El gobierno colombiano ha expresado su intención de orientar todos los esfuerzos por ingresar a Nafta en el menos tiempo posible. Se trata de ampliar el mercado y obtener ventajas para las exportaciones. En el Congreso y en la opinión pública de los Estados Unidos hay conceptos adversos a este ingreso, por las flagrantes violaciones de los derechos humanos y por las denuncias de infiltraciones del narcotráfico en la economía y la política del país. Lo curioso es que en el último lustro, los productos colombianos de exportación han tenido condiciones privilegiadas de acceso a los mercados europeo y estadounidense, pese a ello no se las han sabido aprovechar y nuestra balanza comercial es negativa. El éxito de la integración no depende ya tan solo de políticas económicas, también son esenciales políticas sociales.

Australia and the United States signed a bilateral trade agreement in 2004. This paper analyses the provisions of the agreement, compares the provisions with other bilateral and multilateral agreements and comments on the modelling that the Australian Government used to estimate the likely benefits of the agreement. The author concludes that the modelling relied on overstates the potential gains from the agreement, which establishes many undesirable precedents, especially in relation to sugar, rules of origin, safeguard provisions and intellectual property. The author argues that bilateral agreements of this type could be severely disruptive to future trade relations within the Asian region, particularly with China.

This report addresses the proposed U.S.-Malaysia free trade agreement (FTA). It provides a brief overview of the Malaysian economy, a review of U.S. interests in the proposed agreement, an examination of possible issues likely to arise during the negotiations, a comparison of tariff rates between the two countries, legislative procedures, and an appendix with a brief chronology and trade data — including U.S. exports to Malaysia by sector and exports to Malaysia by state.

This report addresses the proposed U.S.-Malaysia free trade agreement (FTA). It provides a brief overview of the Malaysian economy, a review of U.S. interests in the proposed agreement, an examination of possible issues likely to arise during the negotiations, a comparison of tariff rates between the two countries, legislative procedures, and an appendix with a brief chronology and trade data — including U.S. exports and imports to Malaysia by sector and exports to Malaysia by state.

Free Trade Agreements are increasingly important in modern international trade. Estimates include that in the Asia-Pacific region alone, there are 40 such agreements in place currently, with 70 more under negotiation. Model provisions for FTAs are being developed by The Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation's Committee on Trade and Investment. Without such guidance each FTA tends to have different scope, terms, structure and outcomes; and there is a real danger that international trade is becoming more complex and costly for participants rather than "free". The Embassy for Chile in Australia has requested this report with the following objectives: (i) To be a useful reference guide as the first report summarising the eighteen available provisions; (ii) To offer a brief introduction to the purpose and content of each provision; (iii) To examine each provision from Chile's perspective: identifying areas where Chile's FTA policies are well-served, where they could be better-reflected, and where there may be conflicts. Chile's engagement with these provisions, despite their non-binding nature, is important as: (i) International trade is an important part of Chile's economy; and these model provisions are a way of Chile promoting its foreign trade policies to be incorporated into the models which will substantially influence APEC and non-APEC economies' future FTAs; (ii) These model provisions may be the starting point for a Free Trade Agreement of the Asia Pacific and if this occurs, Chile's current input will have been invaluable; (iii) Reaching consensus with APEC economies is a valuable stepping stone for Chile to develop additional FT As with APEC economies in future years, if desired; (iv) Chile's participation in developing these model provisions serves to cement its position as a regional and global leader in FT As; and (v) Other APEC economies should value Chile's experienced contribution. Several recent Chilean FTAs are analysed to understand Chile's most recent FTA policy goals, and these are contrasted against (i) APEC model provisions already agreed to; and (ii) draft provisions under negotiation. Areas not yet addressed by are listed in Appendix A This paper doesn't consider whether or not FTAs are successful in their endeavours. Developing high quality model provisions and Chile's engagement with such provisions are important and relevant projects regardless. However, in order to consider Chile's and other states' policy objectives, we need to consider the set of reasons states have for entering into FTAs, which may include (i) economic; (ii) political; and (iii) domestic interest reasons. Synthesis Across Agreed APEC Model FTA Provisions Chile abides by the bulk of model FTA provision terms in its recent FTAs. Specifically: Chile's recent FTAs correspond perfectly to two model provisions; Chile's recent FTAs only have minor elements missing from five model provisions; Chile's recent FTAs have a mixed approach to, with many in perfect accordance with and others missing a chapter from two model provisions; There is just one model provision which wasn't addressed in any recent FTA analysed. Synthesis Across Draft Model Provisions Under Negotiation There are still many areas where Chile has an interest in negotiating amendments to the draft provisions to achieve greater consistency with its FTA policy goals. Furthermore: Chile's recent FTAs have no important elements missing from one draft provision; Chile's recent FTAs have a mixed approach to - with at least one FTA missing a chapter on, and at least one FT A covering most important elements of - six model provisions; Chile drafted the provision on Environment, but will still need to negotiate with other economies. Recommendations for Chile: (i) In future FTAs, Chile consider including the minor missing elements from its recent FTAs, in order to be in full accordance with model provisions already agreed; (ii) In future FTAs, Chile try and include a chapter addressing every APEC draft provision currently under negotiation; especially in negotiations with other APEC economies (notably the Australia Chile FTA, and the Chile-Malaysia FTA); and (iii) Chile have a formal strategy for influencing possible amendments to each draft provision currently under negotiation in order best to achieve its FTA policy goals. Recommendations for other APEC Economies: (i) APEC economies consider funding the secretariat to extend its FTA working group's mandate to include implementation of agreed provisions, including tracking and reporting adherence, and having an open dialogue on resolving issues and recurring gaps; and (ii) APEC economies have regular plenary sessions (amongst FTA experts) to resolve as many issues with draft provisions before they are agreed to, to maximise future adherence once agreed.

We study the relationship between participation in free trade agreements (FTAs) and the sustainability of democracy. Our model shows that FTAs can critically reduce the incentive of authoritarian groups to seek power by destroying protectionist rents, thus making democracies last longer. This gives governments in unstable democracies an extra motive to form FTAs. Hence, greater democratic instability induces governments to boost their FTA commitments. In a dataset with 116 countries over 1960-2007, we find robust support for these predictions. They help to rationalize the rapid simultaneous growth of regionalism and of worldwide democratization since the late 1980s.

Indonesia participates in various free trade agreements with its main trading partners and it raises a research problem namely whether the participation would create benefits for Indonesia economic performances. Then, the research problem generates research questions that are what are the impacts of free trade agreements several aspects particularly for economic, social, and environment.Main objectives of this research will focus to assess the impacts of free trade agreements on: (i) economic aspects such as economic growth, export and import performances, balance of trade, terms of trade, investment, inflation, government expenditure and consumption, and sector output; (ii) social aspect such as labor market, wages, income gap between skilled and unskilled labor, social welfare; and (iii) environment aspect.Method of the research employs an economic model of computable general equilibrium on international trade, namely Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP Model 8 version). There are two policy simulations of tariff reduction namely; (i) Simulation I, tariff of agriculture products reduced by 65% and tariff of non-agriculture products reduced by 85%; (ii) Simulation II, tariff of agriculture products reduced by 80% and tariff of non-agriculture products reduced by 100% The research found that in general, impact of free trade agreement benefit for Indonesia economic performances, it indicated by economic variables that contribute positively to the economic performances are greater than economic variables that contribute negatively to the economic performances. The positive economic variables are economic growth, export performance, terms of trade, balance of trade, investment, government expenditure and consumption, wages, social welfare. While the negative economic variables are import performance, inflation, sector output, labor market, income gap of skilled and unskilled labors, emission proliferation.Research limitations related to the secondary data sources that depend on data published by international and national institutions as well as the data that already embodied in the GTAP Model. Policy implication to the government policy namely: (i) to undertake economic and trade reform to improve competitiveness; (ii) to undertake deeply comprehensive study before participation in the FTA; (iii) to give assistances for loser business particularly for small and medium enterprises; (iv) to socialize actively about the FTA to related business community.

We analyze the interaction of economic and political determinants of free trade agreements (FTA). In addition to standard trade gains, FTAs can promote peaceful relations by offering a political forum and by increasing the opportunity cost of conflicts that disrupt trade. If policy makers believe in such pacifying effects of FTAs, country-pairs with large trade gains from FTAs and high probability of conflict are more likely to sign a FTA. Using data on the 1950-2000 period, we show that this complementarity between economic and political gains is at work in the geography of FTAs. Country pairs characterized by a high frequency of old wars - which we use as a proxy of the probability of conflict - are shown to be more likely to sign FTAs, the more so the higher the trade gains from a FTA. These trade gains are estimated by a theory-driven empirical strategy to disentangle them from the political factors. We also show that, contrary to old wars, recent wars make it more difficult to negotiate a FTA. This suggests the existence of windows of opportunity to lock-in FTAs and peace. Finally multilateral trade openness, because it reduces the opportunity cost of a bilateral conflict, increases the political incentive to sign FTAs.

We analyze the interaction of economic and political determinants of free trade agreements (FTA). In addition to standard trade gains, FTAs can promote peaceful relations by offering a political forum and by increasing the opportunity cost of conflicts that disrupt trade. If policy makers believe in such pacifying effects of FTAs, country-pairs with large trade gains from FTAs and high probability of conflict are more likely to sign a FTA. Using data on the 1950-2000 period, we show that this complementarity between economic and political gains is at work in the geography of FTAs. Country pairs characterized by a high frequency of old wars - which we use as a proxy of the probability of conflict - are shown to be more likely to sign FTAs, the more so the higher the trade gains from a FTA. These trade gains are estimated by a theory-driven empirical strategy to disentangle them from the political factors. We also show that, contrary to old wars, recent wars make it more difficult to negotiate a FTA. This suggests the existence of windows of opportunity to lock-in FTAs and peace. Finally multilateral trade openness, because it reduces the opportunity cost of a bilateral conflict, increases the political incentive to sign FTAs.