Thailand to speed up free-trade agreements

[rooster59]

Thailand to speed up free-trade agreements

By THE NATION

 

Weerasak Wangsupakitkosol

 

Deputy Commerce Minister Weerasak Wangsupakitkosol said on Friday (December 6) that next year Ministry of Commerce is planning to host Joint Trade Committee (JTC) meetings with several trade partners including Laos, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Vietnam and Singapore, as well as attend the meetings hosted by other countries, among them Maldives, South Korea, Russia, Malaysia and Japan.

 

 

“We will use these meetings as a platform to finalize free trade agreements (FTA) with pending partners including Turkey, Sri Lanka and Pakistan,” he said. “Furthermore, we will seek new to establish FTA deals with new partners such as the European Union, the United Kingdom, the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), and Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement of Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) to increase Thailand’s competitiveness and expand our export markets.”

 

Weerasak further added that his Ministry will also establish a special fund to assist those entrepreneurs affected by the upcoming FTAs. “The fund committee will be chaired by Commerce Permanent Secretary, and will have its first meeting on December 20,” he added.

 

Meanwhile, Rapibhat Chantarasriwong, secretary-general at Office of Agricultural Economics (OAE), said that the special safeguards (SSG) privileges that Thailand receives from New Zealand under Thailand-New Zealand Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (TNZCEP) will expire on January 1, 2021. “This will result in 3 of our products exported to New Zealand, namely milk, cream and beef being subject to 5, 18 and 50 per cent tax respectively instead of current rate at 0 per cent,” he said. “The OAE will consult Ministry of Commerce to plan measures to mitigate the impact before the expiration date. One of the possible solutions is to find new partners through these JTC meetings.”

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/news/30379170

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2019-12-07

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[brucegoniners]

How about a free trade agreement with the USA so we don't get raped so badly on wine?

 

I doubt if we'll ever not pay high taxes here on foreign made goods. The government makes too much money on them.

[Misterwhisper]

5 minutes ago, brucegoniners said:

How about a free trade agreement with the USA so we don't get raped so badly on wine?

 

I doubt if we'll ever not pay high taxes here on foreign made goods. The government makes too much money on them.

I'd be rather cautious to enter into a "free" trade agreement with Thai politicians. In their mind it is often a one-way street: Thai goods are expected to enter the partner country under no quotas and without any duties and taxes whatsoever, while the Thai side still will slap an assortment of heavy taxes on the partner country's goods, such as "luxury tax". Any foreign product can be "luxury" if Thailand declares it as such. Look at cars, look at wine, look at jewelry, look at electronics, and, and, and...   

[RichardColeman]

3 hours ago, rooster59 said:

Furthermore, we will seek new to establish FTA deals with new partners such as the European Union, the United Kingdom

I like this guy being positive about Brexit !!!

[Thian]

46 minutes ago, Misterwhisper said:

I'd be rather cautious to enter into a "free" trade agreement with Thai politicians. In their mind it is often a one-way street: Thai goods are expected to enter the partner country under no quotas and without any duties and taxes whatsoever, while the Thai side still will slap an assortment of heavy taxes on the partner country's goods, such as "luxury tax". Any foreign product can be "luxury" if Thailand declares it as such. Look at cars, look at wine, look at jewelry, look at electronics, and, and, and...   

They call it: Don't Thai me.....in Singapore.

[Srikcir]

Any country doing an FTA with Thailand should learn from the Australia-Thailand FTA related to the Kingsgate gold mine operation and the Honeywell Project:

• Make it binding arbitration
• do not allow alternative court judgements
• identify examples of potential violations (ie., unilaterally apply additional taxes on imported items/services) due solely to the existence of the FTA (ie., luxury tax, inspection fee, equity tax)
• specify how violations of the treaty are to be processed
• provide penalties for violating the FTA aside from award of compensation due to any damages suffered by the violation (ie., business shutdown, higher operating costs, government mobilization of resources, etc.)
• place a time limit on compliance to arbitration ruling, thereafter accelerating penalties (ie., increased interest on award due) to compel settlement

In general, treat Thailand as an emerging third world economy operated by a "hybrid regime'^* that isn't recognized to operate democratically and operates a judicial system whose independence might be compromised. One purpose of an FTA is to make capital investment in a trade relationship by the participants as predictable and risk-free as possible. Trust but Verify and Compel.

* From Democracy Index Thailand is not a full democracy nor even a flawed democracy.

[BigBadGeordie]

6 hours ago, rooster59 said:

Deputy Commerce Minister Weerasak Wangsupakitkosol said on Friday (December 6) that next year Ministry of Commerce is planning to host Joint Trade Committee (JTC) meetings with several trade partners including Laos, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Vietnam and Singapore, as well as attend the meetings hosted by other countries, among them Maldives, South Korea, Russia, Malaysia and Japan.

Transliteration:.Blah,blah,blah, "Hub", 4.0, blah, blah, blah.

Deputy Minister of ........well sweet fa.

[thailand49]

5 hours ago, brucegoniners said:

How about a free trade agreement with the USA so we don't get raped so badly on wine?

 

I doubt if we'll ever not pay high taxes here on foreign made goods. The government makes too much money on them.

You noticed the countries are pretty much all Asian they Free trade within their self but when it comes from true imports from country like U.S. EU. Brits, it is no different than with China!  It isn't just wine look on the shelve it is everything and I mean everything as small as Ice Cream! To be honest you blame them if they really did free trade the local producers would go out of business! Here you learn how to live with junk.

 

Reasons U.S. needs to put Thailand on the Tariff list before they reach 20 billion if not already! 

[seajae]

problem is Thailands idea of a free trade agreement is their exports are free of duties but the other countries are "free "game and can have any amount banged onto them as we are seeing Thailand do now, if they actually stuck to the agreements and added no duties onto the imported items it would be great but profits and making money from them rates higher than their signed agreement

[Isaan sailor]

USA never gets a break here.  No wonder so few vacation in LoS.  And just look at Baht vs. USD...

[DLock]

8 hours ago, rooster59 said:

“This will result in 3 of our products exported to New Zealand, namely milk, cream and beef being subject to 5, 18 and 50 per cent tax respectively instead of current rate at 0 per cent,” he said.

 

Surely Thailand isn't exporting milk, cream and beef to New Zealand?

 

Or did I read it wrong?

[ParkerN]

5 hours ago, Thian said:

They call it: Don't Thai me.....in Singapore.

If I wanted to create an FTA, the other side would not be Thailand.

 

Their motto should be 'Lie cheat and steal".

 

It's a one-upmanship thing. If you believe their lies, fall for their cheating or accept their stealing then you make yourself 'smaller' than they are and they become smarter than you. It's ubiquitous, they can't help it, it's in their culture and it isn't going to change. Some of them might be quite nice on a 1-to-1 basis but make no mistake, they're all at it and foreigners are their favourite prey.

 

 

 

[Sydebolle]

I am surprised about the listing of other ASEAN/AEC2015 countries; I would have thought that FTAs with fellow member countries would become obsolete.