By Kris M. Crismundo
BAGUIO CITY, April 25 (PNA) — The Philippines has been closely monitoring developments in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement, Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Assistant Secretary Ceferino S. Rodolfo said here on Saturday.
“We are closely monitoring the developments in the United States Congress on the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that is a critical element towards the resolution of contentious issues that are being negotiated in the TPP,” Rodolfo told reporters on the sidelines of Economic Journalists’ Association of the Philippines (EJAP) seminar here.
“Even as the TPP is now closed to new members, the Philippines would like to be in a position to make a decision as soon as the agreement is finalized and the text becomes publicly available. In this context, the Philippines has been actively undertaking technical consultations,” he added.
He mentioned that DTI Undersecretary for Industry Development Group Adrian S. Cristobal Jr. met his counterparts in the US, Australia, New Zealand, and Malaysia and is currently doing the same activities in Mexico and Canada, which are all members of the TPP deal.
“There’s due diligence on our part to be able to make an informed judgment of the overall cause and benefits for the Philippines if ever we will join the TPP,” the DTI official said.
Aside from conducting technical consultations with TPP members, the country is also doing the same dialogue with various sectors, including the civil society, in order to balance the country’s position if it pursues to join the economic pact.
For example, according to Rodolfo, the TPP is looking at extensions of patent which will include medicine. However, the Philippines has the Cheaper Medicine Act that limits the patent rights on medicine in order to make it more affordable to consumers and improve Filipinos’ access to cheaper medicine.
Hence, the country should decide if it can afford to comply with the rules in the agreement in exchange of the access to cheaper medicine as it limits the intellectual property (IP) rights on the product. But, the country may also find out that there might be other factors affecting the prices of medicine aside from the IP rights.
When asked if the Philippines can afford not to join the TPP, the DTI official said the country’s goal in joining the TPP is to have a trade agreement with the US — one of its top trade partners aside from Japan, China, and the European Union — accounting for 15 percent of its total trade in 2013.
The Philippines has bilateral trade deal with Japan while it enjoys free trade agreement (FTA) with China through ASEAN-China FTA.
Even the country has no FTA with EU, some 6,274 Philippine products entering the EU market are tariff-free through the EU Generalized System of Preference Plus (GSP+).
The US, however, is no longer dealing with any countries for bilateral agreements but via the TPP Agreement only.
Currently, the 12 member-countries in TPP are yet to come up with an agreement and specify accession protocol for new members.
Aside from the Philippines, other countries that expressed interest to join the trade pact are South Korea, Taiwan, Laos, Columbia, Indonesia, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and India.
TPP members include Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Singapore, US, Australia, Peru, Vietnam, Malaysia, Mexico, Canada, and Japan. (PNA)