In 2018, 11 countries—Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam—came together to sign the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). The agreement deepened the liberalization of trade in goods and services among the members and broke new ground addressing digital trade issues via a comprehensive e-commerce chapter.

 

This report Nextrade prepared for Google and published with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) seeks to provide early insight into the CPTPP’s potential effects by: (1) looking at trade and investment flows in the CPTPP region in the past few years; (2) exploring the views of firms in the CPTPP region on the agreement and especially its e-commerce chapter; and (3) presenting preliminary findings on the CPTPP’s unique impacts relative to other factors that have shaped trade and e-commerce patterns in the region, such as other recent trade agreements, trade wars, and the Covid-19 crisis. 
 
This report covers five topics:

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• Two Years into the Deal: What are CPTPP members’ trade and investment patterns?

• The Impacts of the CPTPP’s E-commerce Chapter: What do businesses in CPTPP member economies think about the CPTPP’s e-commerce chapter, its impacts, and its enforcement?

• Growing the Bloc: What would countries that aspire for CPTPP membership bring to the table, and how would they benefit, especially from the CPTPP’s e-commerce provisions?

• Impacts on Trade: How has the agreement affected the trade of CPTPP members? Is it possible to tell?

• Beyond the CPTPP: What are the lessons learned from CPTPP countries negotiating e-commerce related provisions in trade agreements?