FEDERAL Trade and Investment Minister Andrew Robb says Australian agriculture will be “the biggest winner by a country mile” via the Trans Pacific Partnership’s (TPP) ratification.
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Mr Robb signed the TPP, paving the way for the historic trade deal to now face political scrutiny in each of the 12 participating countries.
The broad ranging multi-lateral trade deal will eliminate 98 per cent of tariffs between the 12 countries involved and has been roundly welcomed by national farming groups.
Speaking to the media, Mr Robb said the USDA had conducted extensive work on the TPP’s projections concluding that Australian agriculture would be “the biggest winner by a country mile” with a 19 per cent trade increase by 2025.
He said that represented tens of billions of dollars of increased opportunity for Australian farmers.
Mr Robb said many aspects of the TPP were difficult to model but one “significant value” of it was having a single set of trading rules across 40 per cent of the world’s GDP.
Australia’s exports of goods and services to TPP countries totalled $109 billion last year – a third of Australia’s total exports.
In 2014, Australian investment in TPP countries was 45 per cent of all outward investment.
Mr Robb said under the TPP, tariff barriers would be eliminated on US$9 billion of Australia’s dutiable exports to the 12 countries, including $4.3b worth of agricultural goods with new levels of access for beef, dairy, sugar, rice, grains and wine.
He said a further $2.1b of Australia’s dutiable exports will receive significant preferential access through new quotas and tariff reductions.
“The signing of it is just one stage – now every country will go back to their parliamentary systems and take the document and the agreement through public hearings and the parliamentary processes before ultimately this agreement comes into force,” he said.
Shadow Trade Minister Penny Wong said Labor would scrutinise the TPP to ensure it delivered economic benefits without undermining Australian public policies in areas like affordable medicines, environmental protection and balanced intellectual property laws.
Mr Robb said Australia’s scrutiny process would include a Joint Standing Committee on Treaties inquiry and parliament’s consideration of any implementing legislation or amendments.
The 12 TPP member countries are; Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Singapore, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Chile, Peru, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei Darussalam.
