Japan, China and South Korea held the first round of talks to form a tripartite free trade agreement on March 26 in Seoul. Also, Japan and the European Union have agreed to launch talks in April to set up an economic partnership agreement.
If the Japan-China-South Korea FTA and the Japan-EU EPA are inaugurated, they will have a great impact because of the size of the economies involved.
The aggregated gross domestic product of the countries taking part in the tripartite FTA would account for about 20 percent of the world economy. The FTA would also serve as a basis for creating a larger free trade zone in Asia. The Japan-EU EPA would establish a free trade zone in which the two partners' total GDP would amount to one-third of the global economy.
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