The UK and the future of the CPTPP

Last week, the UK’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) came into force in Mexico, changing the rules of trade between the UK and Mexico for the better. The Department for Business and Trade’s Matt Davies joined Canning House to explain how this benefits the UK and explore the future and significance of the agreement as a whole.

The CPTPP is an economic agreement between 12 member states that represent 40% of global GDP. Matt was keen to emphasise that the agreement builds upon existing Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) to provide modern and progressive rules for trade. He highlighted three areas that his team is working on.

Firstly, the members of the CPTPP are deepening the agreement. This means creating modern regulations for a wider range of goods and services, to unlock new markets for British businesses.

Secondly, the members are looking to grow the agreement. Costa Rican accession is almost complete, with Uruguay looking to follow. The CPTPP has high trading standards, and will only accept members that meet those standards, have a history of abiding by their trading commitments, and can command a consensus amongst the existing membership. Now Costa Rica has almost completed the process, this opens the door for future Latin American participation.

Learn why Costa Rica’s accession matters in our recent blog.

The third priority is to explore partnerships with other trading blocs. Dialogues have been established with the EU and ASEAN. These conversations are exploring possible areas for future cooperation, such as digital regulation and creating supply chain resilience.

The conversation explored the benefits of the CPTPP and highlighted the limits of the agreement as it stands, particularly in relation to animal products. A key benefit that emerged is the accumulation rule, which means that any good which is more than 50% produced in CPTPP countries, counting cumulatively, is exempt from UK tariffs.

Davies concluded with optimism that the agreement will continue to grow and become more productive. We thank him for sharing his expert insights on the matter, and our guests for their probing and informative contributions.