Source from (The Star Online): http://www.thestar.com.my/Business/Business-News/2013/07/16/Miti-director-TPP-not-ready-Pact-details-yet-to-be-finalised.aspx
Published: July 16, 2013
International Trade and Industry Ministry (Miti) policy and strategy division director Isham Ishak doused the speculation that the TPP would be signed during the 18th round of negotiations that ares currently taking place in Kota Kinabalu.
Isham also said that the TPP would not be signed in October as many had been speculating.
Miti secretary-general Datuk Dr Rebecca Fatima Sta Maria clarified that several pertinent issues that were of concern to many, such as the bumiputra status, intellectual property rights and state-owned enterprises under the TPP, were still at negotiation stage. She emphasised that the TPP was by consensus, and that no chapter could be concluded as long as there was one party that did not agree to it.
“This is a negotiation among equals,” Sta Maria said.
“For Malaysia, we will ensure that the rights of our business people and our sovereignty will not be compromised,” she added.
The TPP, of which Malaysia became a part in October 2010, is an initiative to establish a comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (FTA) to ensure greater market access for trade and investment to participating members. The agreement currently involves 12 countries, including the four countries that Malaysia has yet to sign an FTA with, namely, the United States, Canada, Peru and Mexico.
According to Miti, it was important for Malaysia to be a part of the TPP at an early stage so that the country could be involved in the shaping of the rules of the agreement and address its concerns such as those pertaining to bumiputra rights, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and sensitive industries. The ministry noted that Malaysia would only lose out if it were to pull out from the TPP now and then decide to join later when the rules for the agreement were finalised, as by then, the country would not be able to give its input and have its concerns included in the deal.
Contrary to detractors who have mentioned that the negotiations in the TPP may infringe the nation’s sovereignty, Isham said the negotiators had representatives from the Attorney-General’s Chambers to ensure that it did not interfere with the policy-making space of the nation.
“Legal scrubbing can take up to a year. There are 29 chapters and only 13 chapters have been concluded in terms of technical matters,” he said at the forum entitled “Explaining the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)” organised by the Young Entrepreneur Organisation Malaysia in Hilton Hotel, KL Sentral.
Explaining the issues to the entrepreneurs present, Isham emphasised that most of the negative impacts of the TPP were unfounded, and that they were working hard to reach a conclusion to such issues.
One of them is the losing out of Malaysian SMEs to foreign competitors.
“There is a special chapter in the TPP that we are negotiating on for our SMEs. We also have programmes to help SMEs, especially for them to venture into the high-value global supply chain,” he said.
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