The Trans-Paciific Partnership (TPP) deal was finalised on October 05, 2015 by 12 member- states to promote economic growth, job creation, innovation, productivity, competitiveness, and living standards, reduction of poverty, transparency, good governance, labour and environmental protection among them. Member-countries of the TPP are Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Singapore, Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, the United States and Vietnam. It has the mechanism to lower trade barriers such as tariffs and establish a dispute settlement platform. Cambodia, the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Taiwan and South Korea have intended to join the newly-formed partnership. The TPP is set to offer comprehensive market access for its member-states within the bloc. It will eliminate or reduce tariff and non-tariff barriers substantially in all trades in goods and services and cover the full spectrum of trade, including goods and services and investment. It will also facilitate development of production and supply chains, and seamless trade, enhancing efficiency and supporting their goal of creating jobs, raising living standards, enhancing conservation efforts, and facilitating cross-border integration, as well as opening up of domestic markets.
The TPP is expected to promote innovation, productivity, and competitiveness by addressing new issues, including development of digital economy, and state-owned enterprises in the global economy. It includes new elements seeking to ensure that economies at all levels of development and businesses of all sizes benefit from trade. It includes commitments to help small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The agreement makes specific commitments to develop trade capacity building, to ensure that all parties are able to meet the commitments made in the agreement and to take the full advantage of its benefits. It could be a platform for regional economic integration of the member-states. The TPP includes both buyer countries and competitors of Bangladesh’s international trade. The USA, Australia, Canada, Mexico, Japan and Singapore are the destinations or would be major destinations of Bangladesh’s exports. On the other hand, Vietnam, Peru, Malaysia and Brunei are our export competitors in these markets. There are debates in Bangladesh about possible impact of the TPP on the country’s trade and investment. Businesses and a few experts say the TPP could emerge as a threat to the country’s exports to the member-countries. If our competitors like Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia etc. get duty-free access, then Bangladesh will lose its existing competitiveness. On the other hand, the Commerce Minister said the TPP will not be a problem because we have got duty-free access to some countries and others are already charging duty on our export. However, it will take time to observe the effects of the TPP on Bangladesh’s trade and investment. But then Bangladesh needs to take precautionary steps to ward off adverse effects of the TPP. If there is a negative impact, we must prepare ourselves to face the situation. One possible solution could be to join the TPP and become a stakeholder of the game. The second option is to sign bilateral free trade agreements with export destinations or at least with most of them. Currently, Bangladesh’s existing relationship with the US and its allies is not at a satisfactory level. As a result, we may not get back Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) facility and their support in many international negotiations. If the situation remains like this for a long period, it will create new complexity for the country in the international arena. From 2005 to 2011, Bangladesh exported goods worth about US$ 35,000 million to the TPP member-states and imported products valued at $32,000 million. This means Bangladesh enjoys trade surplus with the TPP countries. Now, we would like to have a look at the items Bangladesh used to export to the TPP countries and import from them. From the Table – 2, we observed that Bangladesh’s top ten export items to the TPP countries are readymade garments, both knit and woven items, frozen food, leather goods and vegetables etc. If we look at the import items from the TPP countries, then we can easily observe that Bangladesh mainly imports capital machinery and raw materials of various sectors including garments from there. In view of the above position, Bangladesh should actively try to join the TPP as a member-country or sign bilateral free trade accords with them to minimise adverse effects of the partnership on the country’s foreign trade. Otherwise, our export earnings, remittances and investment could be adversely affected by the TPP. If our export earnings and remittance inflow fall drastically, then an economic downturn may not be controlled within the shortest period.
