Yashiro Youichi, professor and prolific writer on agricultural issues in Japan weighs in on the TPP and the US interest in the initiative.
In response to the question, "What does the TPP mean to the US? he has this to say":
The original configuration of the TPP only involved about four countries and about 26 million people. So it seems that the logic was "we are just small nations; let's put tariffs to zero so we can survive."
The problem is that the US has come butting in. Why?
The answer can be found in a speech by President Obama in November of 2009. A new focus of the Obama administration was going to be exports, he explained. And a key new market was going to be Asia. So let's make an American-style Pacific free-trade sphere. But what he had in mind was not just lowering tariffs, but getting rid of trade barriers all together.
In the same speech, Obama asserted that he was America's first Pacific president, and he the US was going to rejoin other Pacific nations.
The Hatoyama administration misunderstood this message. Or, at least they did not thoroughly understand it.
The Asia region has been virgin soil as far as free trade has gone, but in 2005 China started promoting an ASEAN + 3 (Japan, China, Korea) with a common East Asian body. With Hatoyama's new government, Hatoyama firmyl shook hands with Hu Jintao and one again appealed for a common East Asian trade body.
The US was furious about this. Was this "Asia body without the US" not just a Chinese initiative? Kissinger, Armitage and other people familiar with Japan led the charge.
The US started doing its best to get Japan back into its own camp.
Yashiro Youichi spells it out: "Let's think about the real content of the TPP"
No comments:
Post a Comment