The next meeting of the Regional and Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is set to be held on August 2 in Beijing, with the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) plus six other countries in the region – China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and India attending, reported the South China Morning Post.
China is expected to make concessions including reducing tariffs in a bid to push forward stalled talks on a mega regional trade deal when it hosts the 15 other nations involved at a summit. Beijing has reduced duties on competing products from other World Trade Organisation countries to an average of 6.7% in the past year, showing signs of lowering trade barriers for other countries, said analysts from the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
Ahead of the summit, talks will be held in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, Henan province between July 22 and 31.