A supermarket in Thailand (Photo VNA)Bangkok (VNA) - Thailand has submitted to the ASEAN Secretariat its ratification for theRegional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) trade pact and reaffirmedthat the world's biggest free trade deal will come into force on January 1 nextyear as scheduled, according to the Bangkok Post.
The BangkokPost quoted an unnamed source in theThai Commerce Ministry as saying that Thailand, through Commerce Minister JurinLaksanawisit, submitted the ratification for RCEP on Oct 28 to the ASEAN Secretariat,ahead of the previous deadline set in November.
The Thai Parliament ratified the pact on February 9 this year. The agreement, signed by 15 countries lastNovember, will come into effect 60 days after it is ratified by at least six ASEANmember nations and three other signatory countries.
Among the signatories, Singapore and China have completedratification procedures.
The RCEP groups the ten ASEAN member nations - Brunei,Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore,Thailand and Vietnam, as well as Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand and theRepublic of Korea.
Five ASEAN membercountries - Singapore, Brunei, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand, have submittedtheir ratification of the pact.
TradeNegotiations Department's director-general Auramon Supthaweethum said Thailandwill benefit from RCEP in terms of a bigger market because RCEP is the world'slargest trading and investment market, comprising 15 countries with apopulation of nearly 2.3 billion, with a total GDP of 28.5 trillion USD in 2020.
The RCEP trade volume tallied over 10.7 trillion USD or 30.3percent of global trade last year./.
