Japan to update economic partnership pact with ASEAN

February 28, 2019

Tokyo--The Japanese government signed on Wednesday a protocol to revise its economic partnership pact with ASEAN to include measures for liberalizing services trade and investment.

The government will seek approval from the Diet for a draft of the revised Agreement on Comprehensive Economic Partnership among Japan and Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or AJCEP, at an extraordinary session of the parliament, likely to start in autumn.

The revised pact is expected to help accelerate deregulation in ASEAN countries, making Japanese companies' entries into their markets easier. It will also likely speed up procedures for travel within the region.

In Myanmar, for example, regulations on foreign companies' participation into the telecommunications, education, construction and air transport sectors will be eased.

The Philippines is set to introduce an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanism in which companies can sue the governments of foreign countries after being treated unfairly there.

Japan and ASEAN opened negotiations in 2005 on the original AJCEP. It came into effect in 2008 after the parties agreed on tariff elimination and reductions for goods.

In November 2017, they reached an accord on services trade and investment liberalization. Jiji Press