From 1999 to 2018, in the past 10 years, the trade volume of China, Japan and South Korea increased from 130 billion US dollars to more than 720 billion US dollars, and the proportion of the total economic volume in the world increased from 17% to 24%. How will China, Japan and South Korea make efforts in the next decade?
During the Eighth China Japan ROK leaders' meeting, China, Japan and South Korea jointly released the outlook for the next decade of China Japan ROK cooperation, reiterating the commitment made in the joint statement of the leaders' meeting of the regional comprehensive economic partnership agreement (RCEP) in 2019: "we will accelerate the negotiation of China Japan ROK free trade agreement (FTA) on the basis of the RCEP negotiation results, and strive to reach a comprehensive, high-quality and mutual benefit A free trade agreement with its own value.
In the recent "joint interview activity of journalists from China, Japan and South Korea", Zhuang Rui, vice president of the International Economic Research Institute of the University of international economics and trade, gave an exclusive interview with the first finance and economics reporter. She said: "China, Japan and South Korea are all in RCEP. The next question is whether we can talk about a RCEP + between China, Japan and South Korea. This may be the direction of our future efforts."
She said that in the past, the value chain formed mainly by processing trade between China, Japan and South Korea may be undergoing subtle changes, that is, the signing of FTA between China, Japan and South Korea in the future will help promote the three parties to form a new value chain relationship under the new historical conditions.
Building RCEP + Free Trade Agreement
CBN: how to understand the meaning of "accelerating the negotiation of China Japan South Korea FTA on the basis of RCEP negotiation results" and "building RCEP + Free Trade Agreement" proposed by China, Japan and South Korea after the negotiation?
Zhuang Rui: after many years of negotiations, China, Japan and South Korea's FTA has made some progress. At present, although there are trade frictions between Japan and South Korea, which do have some impact on the FTA negotiations between China, Japan and South Korea, I think in the general direction, the FTA of China, Japan and South Korea is still developing in a positive direction.
At present, the difficulty in promoting the signing of the FTA among China, Japan and South Korea as soon as possible may lie in whether we can talk about a RCEP + on the basis of RCEP.
RCEP has completed all the text negotiations, but it has not yet published all the contents. I think the RCEP + of China, Japan and South Korea should be based on RCEP and be able to open up to a higher degree in the fields of trade in goods, trade in services, level of liberalization of investment, rules and standards.
The reason is that the economic development level of China, Japan and South Korea is different from the overall development level of other countries in RCEP. There are still some economies with low development level in RCEP. Therefore, RCEP will also take into account these economies (needs), and will take care of some provisions and specific Opening-up efforts. However, the economic level of China, Japan and South Korea is relatively higher, so the three parties are in a relatively high level The depth of opening up trade in goods and services will be improved.
In addition to deep promotion, the "RCEP + FTA" should also mean that it can cover a wider range of topics, including some of the economic and trade issues in the 21st century. At present, Japan has joined new topics in the comprehensive progress trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (cptpp).
CBN: the gross domestic product (GDP) of China, Japan and South Korea accounts for more than one fifth of the global total, and the economic complementarity among the three countries is very strong. How to further promote the in-depth integration of value chains in the region after the establishment of China Japan South Korea Free Trade Zone?
Zhuang Rui: China, Japan and South Korea are the core three countries in the East Asian production network, and the production chain is very close. However, the production chain relationship among the three parties is indeed undergoing subtle changes: China's labor costs are rising and the economy is undergoing transformation and upgrading. The value chain of the three countries formed mainly by processing trade in the past may also be undergoing subtle changes. The signing of FTA between China, Japan and South Korea will help to promote the formation of a new value chain relationship among the three parties under the new historical conditions.
Considering the relationship of the whole value chain, the only thing that China, Japan and South Korea can do is to unite, to close the production chain through cooperation, to reduce trade barriers and investment barriers through FTA signing, so as to reduce market costs. In this way, enterprises can have stronger response ability in the face of external shocks.
There are always more ways than difficulties
CBN: according to the latest trade monitoring report released by the World Trade Organization (WTO), from mid May to mid October this year, the G20 economies launched 28 new trade barrier measures, including tariffs and import restrictions, involving a total value of 460.4 billion US dollars in commodity trade, setting a new record of G20 trade barriers. How should China, Japan and South Korea deal with the growing global trade protectionism?
Zhuang Rui: on the issue of foreign exports, as far as China and Japan are concerned, a large part of the trade between China and Japan is the trade of intermediate products, which forms a close value chain relationship. This is the characteristics of the trade relationship between China and Japan: China imports parts, assembles and exports.
Trade barriers not only affect China's trade with other countries, but also consider that a large part of the intermediate products in China's trade with other countries come from Japan and South Korea, so we are in a chain.
In this case, Japanese and Korean enterprises can consider changing the export-oriented value chain relationship of "processing and assembling from China to exporting to Europe and America" in the past, and produce more in China and sell on the spot.
CBN: however, at present, there are trade frictions between Japan and South Korea. What kind of impact will this have on the FTA negotiations between China, Japan and South Korea?
Zhuang Rui: Take Japan as an example. Japan has played a promoting role in the cptpp. I believe Japan certainly hopes to promote regional economic integration. China also welcomes various forms of institutional cooperation. As far as the three parties are concerned, their attitude should be consistent: to seek openness and win-win results, we need to take into account domestic interests in some specific details.
At the same time, it's really a pity to see problems between Japan and South Korea, but it's not terrible to see the problems, but the terrible thing is the lack of unity. After the problems arise, we should work together to solve the problems through the platform. The duration of trade friction between Japan and South Korea depends on whether the two sides can find proper solutions on the three platforms of bilateral, regional and multilateral. If the communication is good, the duration will be short; otherwise, it will last for a relatively long period of time, but I personally don't think it will be particularly long.
In fact, there will be small frictions between China and South Korea, Japan and South Korea, and between China and Japan. There are two ways we can do: one is to find cooperation points in small industries; the other is to design the system by three parties, that is, the FTA of China, Japan and South Korea being implemented today.
RCEP covers 16 members, and such a difficult task has been basically completed. More flexibility should be used to deal with the difficulties in negotiation, such as looking for alternative ways of terms or setting up stage solutions. In this way, the deadlock on some issues can be avoided, leading to the failure of negotiations. For example, if India does not participate in the RCEP negotiations, it can be relatively flexible to reserve a place for India, and other (procedures) should be advanced first, and India is welcome to come back at any time. These flexible ways need to be considered together. It is most important to move the negotiation forward. Don't be hindered in details. There are always more ways than difficulties.
(Intern reporter Li Xinjie also contributed to this paper.)
