China, Japan and ROK can all benefit from FTA

Editor's Note: The Center for Northeast Asian Studies at Pangoal Institution, a Beijing-based public policy think tank, released a report on China-Japan-Republic of Korea Free Trade Area negotiations in June. Excerpts follow:

The trade protectionist and unilateral measures adopted by the United States since 2017 are a serious challenge to economic globalization and the free trading system. To meet this challenge and boost their economic growth, China, Japan and the ROK have been working to strengthen cooperation mechanisms in the Asia-Pacific region by establishing the China-Japan-Korea FTA and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.

But the three countries differ on the nature of the trilateral FTA. China regards regional economic cooperation as an important part of its opening-up strategy and has been actively promoting the establishment of the FTA, while Japan, as a developed country, seems more interested in establishing mega-regional FTAs, instead of traditional free trade zones, with improved levels of coordination among "like-minded" member countries beyond East Asia.