First Published in The Hindu Business Line
While most Indians are familiar with Asean, and businesses are aggressively seeking to tap the huge Southeast Asian market, there is a new trade bloc in the making, not too far away, that could deliver more economic benefits.
The Big-3 East Asian economies — China, Japan and South Korea — which account for roughly 17 per cent of global trade, 22 per cent of the global population and 20 per cent of the world’s GDP, kicked off negotiations in the last week of March, aimed at signing a trilateral free trade agreement.
They made small but meaningful progress in their first round of talks late last month, seeking to roll out a free trade bloc that would be the world's third largest after North America and the European Union.
THE CONTEXT
Talks between...
