Sri Lanka
Unlike trade negotiations with behemoths such as India and China, politically-backed protests have not taken place against the Sri Lanka-Singapore FTA negotiations.
President Maithripala Sirisena and the visiting Prime Minister of Malaysia Dato’ Sri Mohd. Najib bin Tun Abdul Razak agreed to expand trade relations between the 2 countries further.
The key objective of ETCA is to resolve the implementation issues on the existing free trade agreement with India.
The arrangement will establish regular senior officials’ talks to facilitate trade and investment.
If one analyses the costs and benefits then it isn’t that difficult to realize that ETCA is a decision by one country and the other is just obeying.
Sri Lanka is likely to sign a Free Trade Agreement with Singapore in October as the island country looks to attract more foreign investments
Sri Lankan industrialists have voiced concern over a proposed free trade agreement with China and government plans to reduce import tariffs that protect them, saying they feared they might not be able to compete.
Sri Lanka has signed a $1.1bn (£837m) deal with China for the control and development of the southern deep-sea port of Hambantota.
Both Singapore and Sri Lanka are committed to concluding negotiations on a free trade agreement before the end of the year, Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said in Colombo.
Dhaka has been negotiating the FTA with Colombo since 2013 to increase trade now worth $80 million every year.
Sri Lanka is closing in on a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China after ending the sixth round of negotiations on trade in services with senior officials hopeful that the deal could be concluded soon.
Sri Lanka and Thailand have come to a consensus on a free trade agreement covering trade in goods. The MoU will be signed in August.
Discussions on the proposed Sri Lanka-Malaysia free trade agreement have advanced into the scoping stage.
Commerce Ministry officials continued their three-day talks on the ETCA to iron out differences on the upgraded Free Trade Agreement of 2000 to include services, investment and technological trade.
Sri Lanka expects to deepen existing FTA with India and to sign a FTA with Singapore and another with China. Sri Lanka also hopes to talk to Japan, Indonesia and other ASEAN countries with regards to FTAs.
Fear of economic domination by the ‘Big Brother’ has replaced the earlier fear of political and military dominance.
Sri Lanka aims to finalise a free trade agreement (FTA) with China later this year, said the country’s ambassador to Beijing
With China too eyeing a similar agreement with Colombo, New Delhi aims to sign expanded FTA this year.
Fonterra has welcomed the announcement that New Zealand and Sri Lanka will progress discussions on new trade and investment opportunities.
New Zealand and Sri Lanka will open diplomatic posts in each other’s nations and are considering a free trade agreement
bilaterals.org team, Jan 2021