THE Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) said it wishes to pursue a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with the United States, which it said would be a more binding mechanism to secure market access preferences.
“We now wish to pursue a Free Trade Agreement with the US, which will be a more binding and permanent mechanism to lock in market access preferences and other binding commitments to expand trade and investment opportunities between our two countries,” said Trade Secretary Alfredo E. Pascual at the AmCham Philippines General Membership Meeting on Wednesday in Makati City.
Apart from the free trade agreement, the Trade chief noted that the DTI is also working on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) with the US, which the Philippines is a member of, along with the US and 12 other countries.
The Trade chief said, “A ministerial meeting on IPEF will be held in Los Angeles early next month.”
Aside from the FTA and the IPEF, the US Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) was also touched on by Pascual in his speech at the American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines’s (AmCham) General Membership Meeting.
The Trade chief underscored, “The Philippines has consistently been a top beneficiary of the US Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) and a significant source of imports for US manufacturers and consumers.”
The GSP deal is a unilateral preferential trade arrangement by the US to 122 beneficiary developing countries and least developed beneficiary countries, including the Philippines. It aims to promote economic growth, development and trade by providing duty-free market access to about 5,000 products into the US.
While the program expired last December 31, 2020, Pascual said, “we are now awaiting the reauthorization of the GSP.”
He added, “our country’s high utilization rates of the GSP demonstrate a growing awareness and demand for GSP-listed export goods from the Philippines.”
The GSP, the Trade chief noted, ushers in tangible benefits such as job creation and skills development for the workers in the Philippines.
The United States, Pascual said, has been an important partner and ally of the Philippines for many years. “It has consistently been among the top trading partners of the Philippines, even against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic.”
“In 2021, the US ranked as the Philippines’s third largest trading partner, the top export market destination, and the fifth largest import supplier,” said Pascual.
In terms of investments, the Trade chief bared that the US remains one of the Philippines’s top sources of investment. In fact, last year, it ranked fifth in total approved investments in the Philippines.
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