The Japan-U. S. agreement to enter negotiations for a bilateral trade deal raises one question: will this lead to the kind of "win-win" situation that Japan has envisaged? Tokyo appears to have acquiesced to Washington and moved away from exploring a multilateral approach to trade issues
The Japan-U. S. agreement to enter negotiations for a bilateral trade deal raises one question: will this lead to the kind of « win-win » situation that Japan has envisaged?
Tokyo appears to have acquiesced to Washington and moved away from exploring a multilateral approach to trade issues as U. S. President Donald Trump is demanding a bilateral deal to fix imbalanced trade.
Even as Japanese officials dismiss the view, a future Japan-U. S. trade agreement on goods will, in effect, be a free trade agreement that Tokyo has been reluctant to negotiate.
Concerns are growing in such sectors as autos and agriculture about Japan being forced into making more concessions.
« It’s no different from an FTA, » said Junichi Sugawara, senior research officer at the Mizuho Research Institute.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Trump agreed during their summit Wednesday that their countries will start negotiations for a trade agreement on goods. Washington will hold off on imposing higher auto tariffs so long as negotiations are under way.
« Both Japan and the United States appear to have gotten what they wanted. Is that a win-win situation? All the United States did was to threaten to impose auto tariffs, » Sugawara said.
At the United Nations, Abe chose trade as his first topic in his address, taking time to explain the contributions of Japanese automakers to the United States, a major auto market.
