India Reorients Strategy to Counter China in Asia Pacific Trade Pact

New Delhi (Sputnik) — India is trying to win the confidence of Asia-Pacific nations by reorienting its approach towards the 16-nation Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). India has decided to play the host for negotiations on the RCEP trade deal in July next year. The pact aims to cover goods, services, investments, economic and technical cooperation, competition and intellectual property rights.

RCEP comprises the 10 economies of the ASEAN members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam besides six of its free trade partners: Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea. RCEP is being considered an ambitious trade bloc that envisages the economic integration countries with 45 per cent of the world population and a combined gross domestic product of $21.3 trillion. However, it is not an exclusive trading club and its members are also part of other multi-nation trade bodies such as APEC.

At the Laos Ministerial in August, India had agreed to abdicate its own proposal of a three-tier system of tariff concessions and offer 42.5 per cent elimination of tariff lines to China. Since the Laos Ministerial, India has softened its approach towards tariff elimination on goods. But it wants to remain unyielding on its proposals for the services sector where it has an upper hand. Government officials termed the upcoming July meeting as very important for India as any failure would further China's dominance in the region.

The meeting will be watched closely because by then US President-elect Donald Trump will be firmly in the saddle. Trump has vowed to kill the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) which was considered a Hillary-Obama initiative to weaken China's economic influence in the region.