Indo-Pacific tilt 'terrifically important' for UK trade says Singham
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For the first time in 50 years, the UK is an independent trading nation. As tensions between the UK and EU remain high, the country can remain positive on its trading outlooks which are now free from the red tape of the EU.
Mr Singham, free trade campaigner and CEO of Competere, is certain Britain will flourish outside of the bloc with new global trade agreements and a membership to the Trans-Pacific Partnership on the horizon.
Mr Singham has earned the moniker ‘Brexiteers’ brain’ in Westminster and Secretary of State Michael Gove once described him as the UK’s “leading expert on trade deals”.
Mr Singham told Express.co.uk the Government needs to harness the benefits of the mega-trade bloc of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which he believes is “terrifically important” and is where “all the growth will be in the world”.
Speaking at the Guildhall in London on Monday, trade secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan said the UK must prepare for a shift in “global economic gravity” towards Asia. She reminded city leaders “the seven largest emerging economies are projected to surpass the economic size of the G7 during the 2030s”, and that more than half of global growth between 2019 and 2050 is expected to come from the Indo-Pacific.
Membership of the 11-country CPTPP – which includes Canada, Australia, Singapore and Japan – will allow British businesses to unleash their full potential, selling across the globe more easily than ever before. The UK has begun the process of joining and would become the sole European country part of the group, a pioneering feat.
Peter Mandelson, former Labour minister, rebutted Ms Trevelyan’s statement and said the UK should “be worried” about the future of the multilateral trading system.
But Mr Singham said: “The CPTPP is just a little part of the Indo-Pacific, without India and without Indonesia, which are the two biggest players. That plus the UK is bigger, global in terms of GDP, than the EU 28 minus the UK.”
Referring to hopeful new trade deals, Mr Singham says that, if you add India, Indonesia and the North American region, “that’s about 60 percent of global GDP” which would amount to £36 trillion.
The UK has already agreed on a pact with Japan and has deals waiting in the wings with Australia and New Zealand. Membership to the CPTPP would remove huge tariffs and barriers to trade for UK businesses.
Mr Singham has more than two decades of experience in trade negotiations around the world. He said: “As a challenge to China, it is where all the action is going to be and from a British exporter, it’s where all the exports are going to go.”
He added: “When we were in the EU, there was a high tariff war against the imports of other countries and there was a big regulatory barrier to the inputs of other countries.” Mr Singham reminds Express.co.uk that British trade with the EU 27 was already declining “from 60 percent of our total trade to maybe 45 percent of our total trade.
“Consider what will happen when you take away that protective tariff wall and protective regulatory wall… You’re going to see massive changes, expanding growth and more profit.”
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