Impact of China's Accession to the Bangkok Agreement on Intraregional Trade Flows

Abstract

Regional Trading Arrangements (RTAs) have been recognized as useful building blocks of a broader trade liberalization strategy over the past two decades with nearly 150 RTAs notified to the WTO. The Bangkok Agreement (BA) established in 1975 is one of the oldest among them. BA was established to promote intra regional trade through exchange of tariff concessions by Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, the Republic of Korea and Lao PDR. China has recently acceded to BA. Due to limited membership and product coverage BA has had limited success in promoting intraregional trade in the past. The accession of China is expected to inject dynamism to it. This article examines the impact of China's accession to the Bangkok Agreement on other member countries. The analysis of the article shows that accession of China is likely to generate vast trading opportunities for the current member countries of BA.

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