China has the willingness and ability to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), said Wang Shouwen, international trade negotiator and Vice Minister of the Ministry of Commerce, when answering reporters’ questions at a regular policy briefing of The State Council on April 23.
Wang Shouwen said China is willing to join the CPTPP. In 2021, China formally proposed to join the CPTPP. The report of the 20th National Congress of the CPC stated that China should open wider to the outside world. To join the CPTPP is to further open up. Last year’s Central Economic Work Conference also mentioned that China will push to join the CPTPP.
At the same time, China is capable of joining the CPTPP. “China has conducted an in-depth study of all the provisions of the CPTPP, and evaluated the costs and benefits that China will pay to join the CPTPP. We believe China is capable of fulfilling its CPTPP obligations.” Wang said that, in fact, China has already conducted pilot tests in some pilot free trade zones and free trade ports against the rules, standards, management and other high-standard obligations of the CPTPP, and will promote it on a larger scale when conditions are ripe.
Wang Shouwen stressed that joining the CPTPP is in the interest of China and all CPTPP members, as well as in the interest of economic recovery in the Asia-Pacific region and even the world. For China, joining the CPTPP is conducive to further opening up, deepening reform and promoting high-quality development. For the existing 11 CPTPP members, China’s accession means three times more consumers and 1.5 times more GDP. According to the calculation of well-known international research institutions, if the current income of CPTPP is 1, China’s accession will make the overall income of CPTPP become 4.
In the Asia-Pacific region, Wang said, under the APEC framework, 21 members are pushing for the establishment of a Free Trade Agreement of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP). “FTAAP has two wheels, one is RCEP and the other is CPTPP. Both the RCEP and the CPTPP have come into force, and China is a member of the RCEP. If China joins the CPTPP, it will help push these two wheels further forward and help the FTAAP advance, which is crucial to regional economic integration and the stability, security, reliability and efficiency of the industrial and supply chains in the region. “We look forward to all 11 member countries supporting China’s entry into the CPTPP.”