Canada, Philippines to start exploratory talks on a bilateral FTA

Canada and the Philippines will start exploratory talks on a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA) within the first half of 2025, officials said.

Mary Ng, Canada’s minister of export promotion, international trade, and economic development, said that an FTA is not only important for Canadian businesses but also for Filipino businesses.

“The reason it’s important is because businesses always look for predictability. FTAs give us the rules of engagement, and I’m very much looking forward to those negotiations, and we are launching exploratory talks right away,” she said at the Team Canada Trade Mission Plenary Session.

“I believe that the teams are going to get together at the very beginning of the new year. We’re already in December, so the new year is only a month away,” she added.

In a joint statement on Thursday, Canada and the Philippines said that they are aiming to meet for a first round of exploratory discussion in the first half of 2025 for a comprehensive Canada-Philippines FTA.

Asked how long negotiations for bilateral FTAs usually take, Ms. Ng said Canada has just recently concluded the negotiations for a comprehensive economic partnership with Indonesia, which was done in just a little over three years.

She said Canada and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have also been working on negotiating an FTA.

“The Philippines is a part of it, so I actually think that there’s some really good work that’s already been done through the Canada-ASEAN table that we can build on, I hope quite quickly and quite easily,” Ms. Ng said.

Ms. Ng also discussed the proposed ASEAN-Canada FTA (ACAFTA) during a meeting with Special Assistant to the President for Investment and Economic Affairs Frederick D. Go and Department of Trade and Industry Secretary Ma. Cristina A. Roque on Wednesday.

Launched in November 2021, the ACAFTA encompasses market access for goods, services, and investments, e-commerce, intellectual property rights, and support for micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises.

Canadian Embassy Senior Trade Commissioner Guy Boileau previously said that the ACAFTA negotiations are targeted to be concluded next year.

“Currently, Canada is an important trade partner of the Philippines. Canada currently ranks 20^th among the many countries, and we need to pump this up,” Mr. Go said.

“And I am very confident that with your visit to the Philippines, this number will only go up. And I hope that maybe before the end of this administration, we should meet again and you are our 10^th trade partner,” he added.

According to Ms. Ng, the Philippines-Canada bilateral trade is currently valued at around USD 5.6 billion — USD 3 billion in merchandise trade and USD 2.6 billion in services.

Trade mission

Ms. Ng is in the Philippines to lead the Team Canada Trade Mission, which comprises 300 individual delegates from 200 Canadian companies and business groups.

“We have a strong delegation of over 300 Canadian participants, and they’re joined by 400 Filipino business leaders, and together they’re looking to forge new relationships and new partnerships,” she said.

Among the deals closed during the trade mission is the investment of Kickstart Ventures in a Canadian artificial intelligence (AI) company called Lydia AI, which seeks to expand insurance accessibility across Southeast Asia.

The Philippine Department of Budget and Management also signed a major contract with Canadian FreeBalance to enhance the department’s financial management systems.

Export Development Canada also opened an office in the Philippines, making it the first foreign export credit agency from a Group of Seven  country to establish a presence in the Philippines.

An administrative agreement under Canada’s Nuclear Cooperation Agreement with the Philippines is also set to be signed late on Thursday.

“This will build on our work in the region through the Trade Gateway for Nuclear Development for the Indo-Pacific that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently announced,” Ms. Ng said. “As a Tier 1 nuclear nation, Canada is positioned to support the Philippines’ energy security goals with our expertise across the nuclear supply chain.”

She also said that other companies have also expressed plans to put a center or an office in the Philippines, such as OpenText, Ostrom Climate, and Maple Leaf Foods. – Justine Irish D. Tabile, Reporter