Philippines fight over trade deal

BBC ^ | August 21, 2007.

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is keen for the deal to be ratified

The Philippine government is urging the country's senate to ratify a $4bn (£2bn) trade deal with Japan, which it says may create more than 300,000 jobs.

The agreement, struck last year, would bolster local exports such as shrimp to Japan, the government said, a market being eyed by trading rival Thailand.

Japan has also pledged to employ at least 1,000 Philippine nurses.

But the opposition-dominated senate has objected with claims the deal would see toxic waste sent to the Philippines.

However, this has been denied by the government, which said that diplomatic notes had been exchanged stating that it would not be accepting Japanese waste in exchange for economic concessions.

The deal was originally struck last year by president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and the former Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi.

Since then a number of Japanese firms have expressed an interest in investing about $4bn in the Philippine economy, with food, automotive and textile industries among those being targeted.

Japan is currently the second largest buyer of produce such as bananas and pineapples from the Philippines, after the [USA].

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Brackets added.

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

At the time of posting, the title of this article on the BBC website was: “Philippines fight over trade deal” .

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Asia pinglist ping.

The Phillipines should take the offer and the Senate should ratify the agreement.

The Philippine (apparently the adjectival form isn't Filipino, after all) population is growing very fast, and the Philippine economy is growing very little. They've been overtaken by Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand in Southeast Asia (and China, if you consider China to be in both Northeast and Southeast Asia) in terms of per capita income.

And China had roughly 1.3 billion people to figuratively drag up (though the country's large size has also made the nation a magnet for investment).

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Phillipines Philippines (since posted the thread, can post oodles of comments).

[DanielLongo]

However, this has been denied by the government, which said that diplomatic notes had been exchanged stating that it would not be accepting Japanese waste in exchange for economic concessions.

I guess they can all sleep peacefully tonight.

[Zhang Fei]

The Philippines simply needs to abolish tariffs and trade restrictions and growth will magically materialize. It is now falling behind China because it has coddled domestic monopolists and oligopolists ever since it became independent. (Of course, if it had remained part of the US, it would now be one of the richest places in East Asia instead of one of the poorest. But that’s the road not taken).

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Of the opinion that the Philippines should have continued pressing for statehood instead of going the commonwealth route. World War 2 was a major catalyst for finally getting statehood for Hawaii. That war could have (in hindsight) had a similar effect on Philippine statehood.

But, then a sizable proportion of the population would be of Asian or African descent, so--considering there are quite a few Americans up in arms about the American population becoming less European in ancestry now--an Asian American state (a state of the United States geographically in Asia) would still have been improbable.