Who to lose most from Trans-Pacific Partnership collapse?

Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan.27 By Leman Zeynalova – Trend: The US will regret foregoing the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), Russell A. Green, Will Clayton Fellow in International Economics at Rice University's Baker Institute (Houston) told Trend. The Trans-Pacific Partnership was a proposed free trade agreement linking the United States and 11 other Pacific Rim economies. The agreement would lower tariffs and other trade barriers among Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the US and Vietnam. The finalized proposal was signed on February 4, 2016 in Auckland, New Zealand, concluding seven years of negotiations. The US President Donald Trump earlier signed an executive order withdrawing the US from the proposed TPP trade deal. But the agreement had not yet received Senate approval, so the executive order was more of a formality. “The direct impact on imports, exports, GDP and employment were likely to be small in any case. Most estimates put it at 0.5 percent of GDP after 15 years. That's almost a rounding error,” said Green. But it could have had major impacts on investment flows, encouraging US firms to open operations abroad and attracting foreign firms to the US, the expert believes. “With all those markets available for free trade, US factories would have looked much more attractive to, say, European or Korean auto manufacturers. TPP entailed significant soft power benefits for US stature in Asia,” he added. Green believes that Vietnam probably loses the most from the collapse of the TPP. “It was prepared to make significant concessions to meet US standards on labor, environment, governance and investor protection that would have made it much easier for Western companies to set up export operations,” said the expert. “Domestic firms, too, would have found much better access to major markets.” TPP does not make sense without the US for Japan, said Green, adding that they made significant concessions opening domestic industries to foreign competition, specifically in the hopes of gaining better access to the US market. “Without that, the deal is politically untenable for Japan. Without the US and Japan, TPP loses its value,” he added. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn