12 countries agree to Trans Pacific Partnership
- Details
- Published on Friday, October 9, 2015
By Kira Paterson
The Neepawa Banner/Neepawa Press
On Oct. 5, the negotiations for the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) came to an end after 65 days. The agreement is between 12 countries and includes nearly 80 million customers. The nations involved are Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, The United States, Vietnam and Canada.
TPP is a trade agreement that will eliminate many tariffs and obstacles between the participating countries to make trade more economical and practical. For Canada, the main advantages will be the tariff cuts to exporting agriculture and agri-food, fish and seafood, forestry and wood products, metals and mining and manufactured industrial goods.
The responses from quite a few Canadian associations have been optimistic. Already, many wheat and cattle, seafood, industrial manufacturing, mining and forestry associations have made statements congratulating and thanking the government agencies involved in negotiating terms for the agreement.
However, there are some organizations that believe that there will be too many negatives to the TPP agreement. Several unions and cooperatives have voiced concern for Canadian dairy farmers as well as autoworkers because of the potential spike in imports of such products.
As for political parties, the Conservatives are in full support of TPP, while the NDP will have nothing to do with it. The Liberal party, on the other hand, does support free trade, but says they will thoroughly examine the pros and cons to this particular agreement before taking a side.
From what the Government of Canada is saying as of now, there will be a lot of benefits from the TPP. Canada has now reached free trade agreements with 51 countries and is the only G7 nation to have free trade access to the US and the Americas, Europe and the Asia-Pacific region. Eighty-one per cent of Canada’s exports already go to members of the TPP and one in five Canadian jobs are directly linked to export.
TPP still has to be approved by parliament before it can be passed and brought into force. That won’t happen until after the election.
Impact on Hylife in Neepawa
By Ken Waddell
The Neepawa Banner/Neepawa Press
Guy Baudry, CEO of HyLife Foods at Neepawa said in an interview with The Neepawa Banner, “The TPP is tremendous news for us. Japan is a premium market for HyLife. The most significant piece is that all TPP members are on a level playing field to compete.” In 2012, HyLife sold a one-third interest in the company to Itochu of Japan, a huge international food company.
Baudry said, “The next element was the fear of higher tariffs (in the future) and there will be changes but there should be no unpleasant surprises.”
HyLife employs over 1000 people at their plant east of Neepawa, with a large portion of workers from The Philippines, Ukraine, East Timor and other locations. They have a headquarters at La Broquerie with several pork production barns across Manitoba and Saskatchewan. They also have barns and processing facilities in China.
