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.
